I Know What You Did
by FallingFantasy
Summary: Peeta has been missing from a "short" trip to District 13. Now Katniss is left alone with Greasy Sae & her two kids. With no arms to hold her. A few questions fill her head. Who killed Prim? Where's Peeta? Katniss sets out on a journey to avenge her sister's death, & to find Peeta. But will the secrets along the way haunt her more than she knows? 1st fanfic! Please R & R! Thanks!
1. Chapter 1: FEAR

***Disclaimer:* I do not own these characters, for they all belong to Susan Collins**

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**Chapter I: FEAR**

I wake up screaming, and sweat is pouring down my face. This time there's no one to hold me. Peeta went to District 13 when Paylor called him for some emergency over four months ago. He hasn't returned since then. "No more nightmares Katniss," I tell myself. It doesn't seem to have the same affect that it has when Peeta says it. "Do you want to talk about it?" I ask myself. "Yes," I respond, "I mean-no, I mean, it was another Prim dream." "Oh Katniss," I say stroking my hair, "It's alright."

But it's not alright. Clearly it's not alright if I have to talk to myself to try to comfort me. Clearly it's not alright if Peeta left a long time ago and hasn't gotten in touch with me to tell me why he's not back. Clearly it's not okay that because Peeta's gone, I _have _to talk to myself to try to stay calm and it's leading me to complete utter insanity! "Mommy," a voice interrupts my angered thoughts. I look over and see Ivy opening the bedroom door. "I had a bad dream."

"It's okay now," I lie to her, "go back to sleep." "But," she starts, "it was a Games dream." Although only seven, Ivy has learned that the one way to get Peeta and I to let her climb into our bed with us is by telling us that she had a Hunger Games nightmare. We both know that with those kind of dreams, we couldn't imagine what it would be like without arms to hold us. But I've stopped imagining, because it's become true, well for me anyways. Ivy climbs into bed with me, and I wrap my arms around her.

Sometimes I like to pretend that Ivy's Prim, and we're laying in our old bed back in the Seam, on the night before the Reaping, just praying that we don't get picked. But tonight, there's no pretending, because my thoughts are with Prim. The real Prim. In my nightmare, I re-saw the scene of her death. But this time I saw who was in the helicopter, but when I woke up, I couldn't remember.

The last thing I saw was Prim screaming. "At least I died saving others," Prim would say. She was so caring. Not even an ounce of selfish. Always thinking of others first, and I see a lot of that in Ivy. After all, Prim is Ivy's namesake. Prim always told me if she had a child, she'd name her Ivy. So that's how Peeta and I chose Ivy Rose.

A silent tear drops down my eye. I quickly wipe it away; I can't let Ivy see my like this. "Mwowww," a nasty cry rings in my ear. Buttercup jumps onto the bed, and starts purring like crazy. He smashes his torn face into mine, and then goes to sit on my legs. He's warmed up to me more, but still won't lay on my chest, but occasionally, he'll curl into my arms at night when we're both sad and need comfort. Ivy slowly pats her lap as she looks at Buttercup to come over and lay on her, but instead he just goes to sit closer to me. "Why won't he sit on me mommy?" Ivy asks.

"This cat's been through a lot…" I trail off thinking of Prim again. "Go back to sleep," I tell her. I'm not up for a midnight conversation, I just want to cry alone with Buttercup curled in my arms, and Peeta holding me. Buttercup hisses at Ivy so I tap him on the nose. "Mom," Ivy whines. "Ivy go back in your bed," I say calmly. "But," she begins. "Now Ivy!" I yell. She quickly gets up and leaves. Once I hear the door shut, I begin to cry.

Along with my weeping, I hear another cry that doesn't belong to me. Buttercup curls himself up in my arms. He rests his head on my right arm, and keeps his brown eyes locked on mine. His ears are drooping, and I know he has the same thing on his mind that I do. "I know," I tell him. "I miss her too." More tears roll down my eyes, and I hold on to Buttercup harder. "I want her back," I say, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have tried to drown you. You're all I have left of her."

An odd whimpering sound comes from the cat. "Try to be nice to Ivy," I say while stroking Buttercup's head, "she's a lot like Prim." Buttercup growls and turns his head away from mine. I close my eyes, and I drift off to sleep with Buttercup in my arms. "We could do it you know," Gale's voice says as he slowly appears, "run away." "We wouldn't make it five miles," I tell him.

"I could," he says. "Well what about Prim?" I ask, "and your brothers?" "They could come too," he says. " I don't know," I say, "Prim, in the woods?" "Yeah," he laughs, "probably not the best idea." The sudden scene of Gale and I together in the woods of District 12 disappears, and instead I see Ceasar Flickerman appear holding my arm up during the interview.

"Ladies and gentlemen," Ceasar says, "Katniss Everdeen, the girl on fire!" "Just promise me something," Prim appears all of a sudden in the room where we said our goodbyes. "Try to win. Maybe you can," she says nodding her head trying to assure herself. "Prim!" I mouth, but no sound comes out, and she slowly disappears like all the others. "Katniss," Rue says laying on the grass, "You have to win."

I awake shaking violently, and Buttercup is still curled in my arms. "Why isn't mommy coming down for breakfast?" I hear Ivy say from downstairs. "Your mother isn't feeling well," Greasy Sae says, "now eat your breakfast." "But what will she eat for breakfast?" Ivy asks. A chill is sent down my spine. She sounded so much like Prim just now, that for a second, I thought it was Prim.

"I'll make her something special," Greasy Sae says. "Where Buttacup?" I hear Finn ask. I'm worried about Finn. He had delayed speech, and is only getting better now. Since he's four, he'll be starting school next year. For some reason, I've been worrying about this a lot. I never wanted kids in the first place, so why am I caring so much? The only reason I gave in was because Peeta said I could choose the names, and I wanted to remember Prim, Finnick, and Thresh. That's why Ivy's name is Ivy Rose, and Finn's name is Finn Thresher.

"Here you go," a raspy voice says. My eyes roll up and I see Greasy Sae feeding me a spoonful of some awful tasting liquid. It's pure black, and it tastes exactly how it looks. I moan, and she feeds me another spoonful. She puts that away and takes another bowl from a silver tray. "Eat the soup," she says, "it's good for you." With that she starts to leave, but right as she reaches the door she stops and turns around.

"Katniss," her nasally voice calls, "I know it's been hard, with Peeta, and Prim and all, but, your kids need you." The door shuts, and I'm left alone with my soup and Buttercup. Anger slowly starts to build up inside of me. Who is she to tell me how to raise my kids? I'm doing just fine raising them on my own after all I've been through! She's never even had kids!

I take my bowl of soup and throw it against the wall. It shatters into pieces, and the soup spills all over the white wall and the carpeted floor. With more frustration, I let out a scream, which makes Buttercup turn immediately to see what the commotion is. Nearby downstairs, I hear what sounds like a sigh coming from Greasy Sae, who is probably cleaning the dishes with her torn red rag by now. I stare at the door, waiting for the Avox girl to come in and clean up the shattered bowl, help me clean up myself, and tell me it was okay even though I still felt guilty about what I did to her.

But after a long time of waiting, there's just disappointment. Of course she's not coming. She's dead. Just like everyone else. Just like Finnick. Just like Cinna. Just like Prim. Just like Rue. And now, probably just like Peeta. A sudden thought pops in my head. Was Greasy Sae trying to help me? Maybe she wasn't insulting me. But why?

What about me makes her care? I begin to realize the message she was sending me. Greasy Sae is a spitting image of what I was going to be if the Hunger Games still existed. I wasn't going to get married or have kids. Greasy Sae is the past, future me. I can't help but feel guilty. Maybe she regrets not having a family. After all, she's working for some young girl whom she really has no relationship with.

But something else is bugging me. Another message comes to me from what she said. I'm becoming my mother. I'm tuning out, and I'm leaving my kids to provide for us. But they're too young. No. This isn't true. They've got Greasy Sae to take care of them. So it's better. "What are you saying Katniss?" I hear Peeta's voice in my head, "They need you! It's not any better when you aren't doing anything! You need to get up and move!"

Peeta's fake voice in my head is right. I need to do something. I'm acting how I did when the rebellion was over. And Peeta. Where is he? Paylor said there was an emergency in District 13, and she needed him urgently! She even said it would only be a few weeks! Why hadn't Peeta called? Why hadn't she called?

I just can't take it anymore. I pull the covers off of me and jump out of bed. I go to my wooden dresser and get out a pair of jeans, a white tee, and my dad's hunting jacket. As I put it on, I notice my bow and arrows aren't in their normal place. I open the door and march downstairs to the kitchen. "Good to see you up and running Katniss," Greasy Sae says. "Where are my bow and arrows?" I spit out.

"Oh," she says, "I put them in the shack outside." "What?" I ask angrily. That shack's roof has cracks, and the door is broken. Anything could've happened to them! An animal could have wrecked the shed, or they could've gotten soaked in a previous rain shower. "Momma play with us," Finn says. "Not now Finn," I say stomping out of the house.

I run over to the shed to check on my bow and arrows. Luckily, they aren't damaged. I grab the arrow bag and throw it over my shoulder, and tuck my bow under my right arm. I don't bother saying goodbye, or telling them where I'll be for the next few hours, but Greasy Sae probably already has an idea. So I run to the old gate that hasn't worked for years. I still don't know why they haven't taken it down.

It's the only thing still existing of the old District 12. Now District 12 is a beautiful, quiet place. It's still a small town where everyone knows each other, but all the major photo shoots for fashion magazines are done in the woods here. It's really annoying when I'm trying to shoot a squirrel and I see some girl practically stripping for the photographer. Their cameras' flash always scare my prey away.

They've added a gate that you can open and close to get in the woods, but I still choose my usual way of going under. Even though they fixed that a long time ago, over the years it's loosened again, and they've removed all the barbed wire. I run into the familiar scenery that I haven't been in for a while now. This is my first time hunting ever since Peeta's been missing.

I pick up some autumn leaves and rub them in my hands. Next I take some dirt and slather it over my arms to blend in with the scent of the woods. The leaves are slowly falling, which make it easier to see prey that are hiding in branches. Nearby I think I see a deer, which have become more abundant. "Damn you Gale," I had said many years ago, "That was the first deer I've see in a long time and you scared it away!" "Sorry Catnip," he had said with a laugh. Gale was never that bad.

But yet I still hold a hatred in the pit of my stomach for him. He never even talks to me anymore, or said why he left. After Prim died he didn't speak to me anymore, and that was when I needed comfort most of all. I take an arrow from my back and load it into the bow. I hold the bow back and slowly begin to pull the string. "Uh, uh," I hear a sound. This scares the deer away, just like Gale did. "Shit!" I mutter under my breath. With anger I stomp towards the source of the sound.

I stop when I think I see something, and hide behind a tree. In front of me are two teenagers. One tall girl with long blonde hair, who's wearing an awfully short white frilly dress. Sucking her face is an even taller boy. He has light brown hair, and is wearing jeans and a black t-shirt. Sick. They're practically inhaling each other. Do it at home, not in public. I know I'm only in my twenties myself, but even I know better. You wouldn't catch me sucking faces with my boyfriend like that in public.

The boy is practically ridding her of her clothes. "Hey rent a room!" I yell. I quickly climb up the tree and hide in it before they see me. I hear them stop, and they both turn to see who said that. The girl's face starts to become bright red. I become proud of myself; that was something Gale would've said. We would've laughed and laughed, and celebrated on our small accomplishment with some squirrel meat.

"Come on babe, let's go back to the house to finish." "But we've come all the way out here…" her soft voice says. "I'll pay you extra then," he says as they begin to leave. Gross. The last thing we need are more whores. Oh my god. I quickly turn to take one more glimpse at that boy. I knew he was familiar! The light brown hair, the sound of his voice, his sickly action.

He seemed so much like Cray, the old Peacekeeper who paid poor women to come in his bed. That must be…his son. Or one of many. He had so many women crawling in his bed with him, who knows how many kids he had. I have faint memories of Cray when he was younger, before his hair was silver, and that kid looked just like it. But I'd bet my life that, that kid was a son of his. As I'm about to climb down from the tree, I see a squirrel just in shooting distance. I load my bow again, and carefully concentrate on it's eye.

I pull back the white string, squint one eye, and release the arrow with my hand. Bullseye. I climb down from the tree to receive my kill. "Now you go get some wood," Gale would say. "And what are you going to do?" I would ask him. "I'm going to sit here and make sure that no one steals the squirrel." "Aren't I glad I have you as a partner," I'd say sarcastically. "Hell yeah you are Catnip," he'd say with a smile. This time there's no one to make jokes.

I have to find my own firewood this time. Of course I don't have Gale's hand-on secret skills to chop a tree down. I'll be lucky if I can cut down some branches on my own. As I look around, I notice that most of these tree branches are way too thin to use to make a fire. I decide to go back to the tree I was hiding in earlier. Most of the leaves are still on the thick branches, so they will help start the fire faster.

I climb up the tree with no trouble, and sit on a high branch. There's another one close under it, so I reach over to chop it down. I pull out my pocket knife, and start to saw the branch. I feel like I am sawing the Trackerjacker nest to drop on the careers and Peeta in my first Hunger Games. After a while it chops down, and I wait for the screams of the other tributes, but there are none. I jump down to another branch, and keep sawing them down until there are no more branches close enough together.

I end up having enough, and the branches fall close enough together that I don't need to move them. I collect a few rocks and thinner branches, and I begin to rub them together. A spark appears, and then it goes away. So I rub harder, and then I get a fire. I throw the rocks and branches onto the firewood and a huge fire starts. "Now for a stick," I say looking around for another thin branch. I find one near me, pick it up, and skewer it through the squirrel meat after skinning it.

"Not bad Catnip," I say acting like Gale, "not bad." Before I know it I've finished the squirrel meat, and it's fallen dark. "Better get home," I say. I gather my things and start heading for the gate. I slide under and run all the way home. "Good to see you back Katniss," Greasy Sae says. "Just in time to read me a bed time story!" Ivy exclaims. "Not tonight Ivy," I tell her. "When?" she asks. "Some other night," I say, "Sae will read you one tonight?"

I rush upstairs to my room and hide my bow and arrows in a locked drawer. I hear a hiss behind me, and of course it's Buttercup. "Back to our old selves aren't we now?" I ask with a laugh. Buttercup cocks his head and I know what he's looking for. My one- minute happy self dies again, and I go back to being depressed. "We aren't repeating this scene again," I say, "you know where she is."

I run into the bathroom and try to hide my tears by taking a shower. They've made all the showers in the districts like the old Capitol showers, but I wanted a normal one that the richer districts used to have when they were under control of the Capitol. I can't stand bathing in a large bucket. As I sit in the shower, I stare at the purple razor on the shower shelf. It was sent to me in the mail by Octavia, who no one knows where she is now. For all I know she's dead too. Which is likely.

It came with a message written on fancy purple and white paper. "We know Cinna would've wanted you to have this," she had said. Cinna wouldn't have wanted me to have that. They just wanted to make sure I wasn't a hairy mess. I've used it a few times, but whenever I do I always get cut and there are always patches of hair left over. The only thing I consistently do is pluck in-between my eyebrows so I won't get a uni-brow.

I drain the shower, and grab a green towel to wrap around me when I come out. I walk over to my dresser, where I find a black hair tie. The same tie that my mother used to make my braid on the day of the reaping. The same tie Cinna used to braid my hair for every event during the Hunger Games. I'm surprised the tie has lasted this long. I pick it up, and move it around between my fingers. After examining it for a while, I decide to try to braid my hair how my mother did.

It's not as great, but it's a close call. I drop my towel on the floor, leaving me naked. I put on my undergarments, and slip over some long grey pajama pants and a green camisole. "Are you here to make me look pretty?" my voice echoes in my head as I stare at myself in the mirror. "I'm here to help you make an impression," Cinna had said. I can't take it anymore, so I turn my lights off, and crawl under my covers to fall asleep. Tears start to fall down my eyes. I curl up into a ball and wrap my arms around my legs.

"Katniss," I hear Greasy Sae's voice say as the lights come on, "have you had dinner?" I wipe my eyes and stare at the wall. "Yes," I tell her. "What did you eat?" she asks checking to see if I am lying. "Squirrel meat," I say. "Now Katniss," she says, "You can't starve yourself. Your children need you and…" "I had squirrel meat!" I scream at her. "Okay," she says, "goodnight." She quickly turns off the lights and leaves, closing the door behind her.

"What am I supposed to say?" I asked Cinna. "Just try to make them like you," he had said. "Well if you haven't noticed, I'm not the best at making people like me," I told him. "Well I like you," he said. "That's because it's easy to talk to you," I had said. "Well just pretend you're talking to me. Just look at me, and say the answers that you would tell me." I wish Cinna was here still to be my personal adviser. Greasy Sae can't do that.

"You should give her a chance," Cinna would say, "You're shunning her out, and won't even let her. Just try to be nice." "If I were you sweetheart," I hear Haymitch's intoxicated voice say, "I'd start being friendlier. You aren't gonna get yourself any sponsors with that attitude." I begin to doze off, and tonight I dream of Cinna.

I wake up in the morning not sweating nor shaking violently. I look at the clock, 6:00 AM. I get up and put on my usual outfit I would wear to go hunting. But this time, I'm not going hunting. I need to talk to Haymitch. He's all I have left. I silently sneak downstairs hoping not to wake up anyone. As I open the door to go outside, I hear a voice behind me. "Going hunting?" I turn around and see Ivy. "Ivy," I say, "what are you doing up this early?" "I couldn't sleep," she says.

"And no," I say, "I'm going to talk to Haymitch." "Can I come?" she asks. "No," I tell her. "Why not?" she asks. "Because Haymitch is a bad influence," I tell her. "And he's all I have left to talk to. You wouldn't understand." "You have me to talk to," she says. "Not about the things I need to talk about," I say. "I know what you need to talk about," she says. "I know I wasn't there, and you don't think I understand, but I really do. Just because I'm seven doesn't mean I don't get things."

"You just don't know a lot of things that Haymitch does," I say. "Trust me," she says, "I know A LOT more than a seven year old should know." I can't help but let a smile come across my face. I sit down at the kitchen table, and she sits next to me. "You are going over to Haymitch's to talk about Cinna," she says. "How'd you know?" I ask her surprised. "Because your hair is in _the braid_," she says emphasizing 'the braid' as if it is some famous name. "Which means you were thinking of him last night."

"I guess you do know a bit more than most kids do," I say getting ready to leave. "I wasn't done," she says. "Look," I say, "I know you're probably wondering why I haven't been spending time with you guys and everything but-…" "I'm not wondering that," she cuts me off. "I know why. It's because of dad. And Cinna. And Gale. And Finnick. And Rue. And Prim."

I shiver at Prim's name. "I wish I knew her," she says looking down. I take a look at Ivy. Her hair is darker than mine, and is very dark brown, almost looking black. She has beautiful light blue eyes and pale skin, but her facial shape and eyes look just like Prim. She even has the same long hair Prim does - I mean - did.

"Well you act just like her," I tell her. "I do?" she says. "Yeah," I admit. "Is that why you don't want to be around me?" she asks. "No, no," I tell her. I take her hands in mine. "I would never not want to see you because of that," I say while I give her a light little tap on her nose. "But I know it's hard for you," she says. I let out a sigh. "She was so selfless. And kind. Always thinking of others first. She was very bright too. And it's just that, I see a lot of that in you."

"Mom," Prim says. No. Not Prim. Ivy! Oh god not Prim! Ivy! Ivy! Ivy! I need to get this Prim thing out of my head. I can't replace her, and I'm not going to only love Ivy because she reminds me of Prim. "Is it true?" "Is what true?" I ask with a sweet tone and a big smile. "That you didn't want us, me and Finn?" "Well," I say changing my tone now, "I didn't want you at first because I didn't want to have to watch my kids go through reapings and possibly be picked." Ivy nods, but she still seems unsure.

"You still don't know who was in that helicopter?" she asks. "No," I say, "but I think it was President Coin." She nods slightly, but doesn't seem to agree. "I'm going to Haymitch's now," I tell her as I get up, "thanks for the…help. It was nice talking." "Mom," she says. "Yes?" I ask her as I turn around. "Will you sing the lullaby to me?" I hesitate for a moment. A guilty look spreads across her face. The same guilty look that used to spread across Prim's face.

She knows about Rue's Lullaby. She knows I tear up whenever I sing it. She knows I used to sing it to Prim when she had nightmares. "Or if it's too soon…"she starts. "No," I whisper trying to hold back my tears. "I'll be fine." I walk her upstairs and tuck her back into her bed. I sit on the edge and stare at her just like I used to with Prim. I open my mouth, but nothing comes out. I try again, and this time, lyrics start flowing out.

_Deep in the meadow, under the willow_

_A bed of grass, a soft green pillow_

_Lay down your head, and close your eyes_

_And when they open, the sun will rise_

_Here it's safe, here it's warm_

_Here the daisies guard you from every harm_

_Here your dreams are sweet-_

_-and tomorrow brings them true_

_Here is the place where I love you._

_Deep in the meadow, hidden far away_

_A cloak of leaves, a moonbeam ray_

_Forget your woes,-_

I'm suddenly cut off when Ivy presses her finger to my lips. "Too soon," she whispers. I notice that a tear is falling down my eye. "I'm sorry," I whisper back. She nods to show me it's okay. As I walk out, I shut off the lights and turn to leave. But I hear a sound from behind me.

_Here is the place where I love you._

_Here is the place where I love you._

"How did you know those were the last lines?" I whisper. "Because they leave on a happy note," she tells me a bit embarrassed to see I heard her. I mouth an "oh," and close the door behind me. I run downstairs and sit back in the chair at the kitchen table, and lower my head into my arms. Tears fall from my eyes again. "Mee-ow!" Buttercup cries as he jumps on the table. He shoves is head onto mine and begins to purr. I get up from my spot and wipe my tears, and walk out the door over to Haymitch's house. Now, it's right next door instead of across. We decided to stay in Peeta's Victor's house because mine was filled of too many bad memories.

We turned mine into the town bakery, which is very popular, but since Peeta's gone, there's been no one to run it. "What do ya want sweetheart?" I hear Haymitch's voice say as I slam the door behind me. "You're drunk again!" I exclaim. "I thought we agreed you'd stop this!" "And why do you want me to stop this….habit of mine sweetheart?" he asks, "because when I'm sober you can't consult me with your problems? Because you can't come complain to me and get sensible advice?"

He stands up from his chair, and supports himself by gripping the table. "Well maybe, I don't want to listen to your problems all day long. Maybe I've got problems of my own. Maybe that's why I drink." He takes another swing of the orange-brownish looking liquid, sets it down, and then sits back down. "Ah," he relieves, "that's good."

"Want some?" he asks holding the jug out to me. "No," I say pushing it away, "this has happened before. And I was miserable the next day." "Not if you keep taking some the next day," he says, "then you never feel bad!" He slides off his chair to the ground, and hits his head against the chair. "Haymitch!" I yell at him, "get up now and stop!" I go to pick up the jar from the table, but before I can a knife lands between my hand and the jug. "This has also happened before," he says, "and I also told you the last time to not forget I survived the Hunger Games too."

I grunt as I roll my eyes and throw my head back. I leave the house and walk over to the small shed outside of mine. The dumb old door won't budge, so I kick it open, and once it falls, all the pieces of it break, so I walk in. No more door. I look around for my bow and arrows, and realize that I moved them. With another grunt, I open the door to the house and run upstairs to the locked drawer where I hid them. The key.

Where's the key? Damn't Katniss where'd you put the key? I run around the room like a crazy person, looking for the stupid golden key. I end up finding it on my dresser in the bathroom where the hair tie was laying last night. I'll show Haymitch. As I walk to the drawer, Buttercup jumps out from his hiding place and starts to attack my ankle. "Not now cat!" I yell at him as I shake him off. I make my way to the drawer and shove the key in. It opens with ease, and I grab my bow and bag of arrows.

From my bedroom window, I can see the window from the kitchen of Haymitch's house. His table is right next to it, and sitting on the table is the glass bottle of alcohol. If I aim from here, the arrow will hit the side of his house, and fall down, and it will leave it bent. But if I can tilt my bow the exact right amount of degrees down, I can probably just make it. I only have one shot, because if it goes through and doesn't hit the bottle, Haymitch will notice.

I tilt my bow diagonally down, and try to make it in alignment with the window. The arrow will lose speed, so if I can shoot it a bit higher it will fall just to the right spot where the bottle is. I grab an arrow from my bag and load it into the bow. "One shot," I tell myself, "just like that apple." I slowly begin to pull back the arrow, and with one steady breath, release. I watch as it zooms straight down, and cracks through the middle of the kitchen window, causing it to shatter. The arrow keeps going for a second, and breaks through the jar, causing the liquid to spill everywhere.

"Whaa," I hear Haymitch say. He looks up and sees the disaster that has just happened. His eyes roll up, and he looks at me to see myself smirking in the window. "You're not the only one who's survived a Hunger Games," I mutter under my breath. By the time I get through with that, it's already eight o' clock. Greasy Sae will be getting up by now, which means she'll be waking up Ivy and Finn.

I decide to join them for breakfast downstairs this morning, just for the hell of it. When I get down, Finn doesn't hesitate for one second. "Mama can we go play at the playground?" he asks. "Not today Finn," I tell him. What Finn doesn't know is the "playground" is really the "graveyard" where we buried our loved ones. Or, the ones who we knew where their bodies were anyways, or the bodies that weren't blown to bits. For the ones who couldn't be buried, we put tombstones anyways in honor of them. Prim didn't get to be buried, so her tombstone is the first and the largest you see when driving into the place.

As far as the kids know, the tombstones are decorations. But Ivy never seems to want to go anymore, and I think it's because she's catching on to what it really is. "I'll take them to the gra-I mean playground," Greasy Sae catches herself. "I don't want to go," Ivy says. "Aww why not Ivy?" Sae asks as she bends down to Ivy's height. Ivy whispers something into Sae's ear, and she nods understanding. Ever since they fixed my ear, I can hear 100 times better than a normal human being, so I could hear every word of what she whispered.

"Because I know it's not a playground," Ivy had said. "I'm finished with my breakfast," Ivy says, "I'm going to my room." "You want to play with your dolls?" Sae asks. "No thanks," Ivy says as she gets up to leave. "Okay then," Greasy Sae says, "we'll be leaving to go to the…playground now." "Bye," I say. "Mommy not coming?" Finn asks while tugging on Sae's pants. "_Is _mommy not coming," I correct him.

Greasy Sae gives me a dirty look, and I mouth a rude "what?" to her. "I want him to speak well," I tell her. "It takes time," she tells me calmly. "Let's go Finn," she says, "I'll meet you in the car." She opens the door for Finn, and he happily skips outside. "You've got a smart girl there," Greasy Sae tells me, "she's very grown up. A lot like…" she pauses for a moment, "your sister." She quickly shuts the door behind her and leaves.

"Mom," I hear Ivy say. I look over and see her peeking out from behind the open doorframe in the kitchen. "I thought you went upstairs," I say. She shakes her head. She's very quiet on her feet too. Just like Rue. "Will you take me hunting?" she asks. "The woods are no place for a girl your age," I tell her.

"I wish I were older," she complains as she sits across from me. "Don't say that," I tell her. "And like you," she says. I pause for a moment and think about what she said. "Prim used to say stuff like that," I tell her, "she used to tell me that she wished she looked like me, but I told her that I wished I looked like her." "Well did you?" Ivy asks. "Sometimes," I say, "more than anything I wish I acted like her. She was always so kind." "Was she very pretty?" Ivy asks. "Yes," I tell her, "very. But appearances have never been that important to me," I say.

"But you are pretty," she says, "and daddy's…pretty?" I laugh. "Please," she begs, "I'll stay out of your way, and be super quiet. I'll just be an observer." I bite my lip as I think about this for a moment. "Just this once," I say, "but stay by my side, and stay out of anybody that comes along's way." I gather my things, and take her hand and get going. "Are we taking the other car?" she asks. "I never take the car to the woods," I tell her.

The walk down there is very quiet, but I realize that Ivy seems very distracted by all of her surroundings. What distracts her the most is the big gate. Her eyes begin to widen, and she starts to back up. "Hey, hey hey," I say and turn around. "It's okay, it's not going to hurt you." "It's an electric gate," she says. "It was," I tell her. "How'd you know?" "Because all the birds have built their nests up high, so when their babies fly, they won't run into the gate immediately and die."

"How do you know these things?" I ask. But she doesn't answer. "There's the gate door," I point to it and show it to her. "See it's not electric," I place my hand on it to show her. I try to figure out how it opens, but it's not like most gates. I can't find where it hooks, so I begin to scan the whole thing. I finally find it, but the gate won't budge. "Pull up and push," Ivy tells me. I do so and the gate opens easily. "Do you not usually go this way?" she asks.

"No," I say as we keep walking into the woods. "I usually go under the gate." "Why?" she asks. "Because that used to be the only way," I say. She immediately seems to understand. As we reach my usual hunting spot, I tell her to stay quiet. I point to a squirrel, and point to its eye. "Why the eye?" she whispers. "Because it dies instantly," I tell her. I grab an arrow from the bag, put it in the bow, and shoot the squirrel. "Wow," she says, "in one shot."

I hand her the bow and set down the bag of arrows. I run over to retrieve the squirrel, and pull out my pocket knife to skin it. "Okay now hand me my bow and arrows," I say as I walk back over to her carrying the squirrel meat. But before I know it, Ivy's launched an arrow of her own. "It was a bit heavy," she says with a proud voice, "but I managed." "Ivy Rose Mellark!" I yell at her. "Don't every do that again! You could've hurt yourself!" I'm about to rage on, when I see what and where the bow landed. It landed right into a squirrel's eye, several feet above her into a tree. "How did you…" "I watched," she answers.

"Did I kill it?" she asks panicked. "I didn't mean to, I mean, I was just trying and.." "Ivy," I cut her off laughing, "it's fine. You did very well." That evening, we enjoy a feast of cooked squirrel meat. She wouldn't skin the squirrel though, she said she couldn't bare the sight. "So I guess you won't end up being a veterinarian huh?" I ask her as I finish the last of my meat. "No," she says, "because if something goes wrong I know it will be my fault that I killed them."

"Well that's good that medicine's cleared out of the way," I say. "Well," she says, "I might not be a surgeon doctor that's for sure, but I want to help take care of the sick, or save lives or something," she tells me. "What?!" I ask getting panicked myself now. "I know it may seem silly for a seven year old girl to already be thinking about that, but-…"  
"No Ivy!" I say, "You aren't going to be anything involved with health!" "Why not?" she asks still pecking at her meat. "I think it'd be nice to give back to people, not only that but…" "No Ivy!" I say, "that's final! I won't lose you to that too!"

A long moment of awkward silence fills the air. "Oh," she finally says. "Well I'm only seven. I may end up not doing that." "No," I say, "that's not an option for you." "But once I'm eighteen you can't control me, so I could if I wanted to?" she asks not being rude at all. "I lost one person to it. I'm not losing another. You're too much like her…" I quickly cover my mouth. "So that's why you've been hanging around by me…" she says. "No Ivy I didn't mean it like that, yes you are a lot like her but I don't not want to lose you only because of that. I meant to say that you really are like her, and that…" "And that you can't lose her two times," she finishes.

"It's not like that Ivy," I say, "yes I can't. But I can't lose _you_ either. Ivy Mellark. Not Primrose Everdeen." At least Ivy isn't older. This is going to be a huge problem when she is though. We're probably going to get into many fights about this. And now I'm worried that from now on, deep down she's going to think I only love her because she acts like Prim. I do love her because she acts like Prim, but I do love her for her too, right? Of course I do. I need to stop pretending she's Prim. That's sick.

I try to avoid the subject by packing up our things and telling her it's time to go. "So what did you think of hunting?" I ask her when we are half way through the woods to the gate. No answer. I look to see what's keeping her from saying anything, and see that she isn't there. "Ivy?" I shout in panic while turning around. "Ivy!" I hear a small giggle from above. I look in the direction of the sound, and see Ivy in the tallest branch of a high tree. She's hiding behind the leaves, and all I can see are her blue eyes poking out.

Her face suddenly starts to change, and so does her body. He arm reaches out and points, and for a second, she becomes Rue, pointing to the trackerjacker nest. I turn around to see the nest, but instead I see a mockingjay. "Wanna see something cool?" I ask her. She nods her head and stares at the mockingjay. I begin to whistle the call that Rue used to let people know work was over, and that we used to let each other know that we were okay.

All the birds fall silent as I whistle, and wait a while after I am done. Then they pick up the tune, and start repeating it. "Wow," she says. "The call of the mockingjay…" "I guess you could call it that," I say. "They all stopped when you whistled," she says as she jumps down from the tree. "You have a wonderful voice." "Thanks," I say, "so did my father." "Is that Rue's call?" she asks. "Yes," I say looking down.

She puckers her lips together and I watch her struggle to whistle. "How do you do that?" she asks. "It just takes practice," I say. She sighs, and opens her mouth instead. She begins to sing the melody, and all the birds fall silent too. They start to repeat the tune again afterwards. "They fall silent for you too," I say with a smile.

She smiles too, and we continue to whistle and sing the tune all the way home. "I should take you hunting more often little duck," I say. I gulp and feel sick again. "I mean, Ivy." "Did you call Prim that?" she asks. "On the day of the reaping," I say as we open the door to the house. "Her shirt was my old one, and it was too big on her, so it gave her a duck tail. I kept having to tuck it in." "Oh," she says as she sits down. "I'm sorry," I say, "you just act so much like her, it's hard not to call you those things." She nods and disappears upstairs to her room.

Greasy Sae comes over from nowhere, and sits down next to me. "How long have you been home?" I ask her. "Not long," she says, "I just put Finn down for a nap. It seems like you two were getting along very well," she says. "Yes," I admit, "she's a quick learner. You were right about her being just like Prim." "It's in your genes," she tells me. "She wants to be in health Sae," I tell her. "She wants to save lives."

"Well she is only seven," she says, "she doesn't know what she wants." "Yeah," I say, "but Prim wanted to do that early on. And look at her now, that's how she died, and she was only thirteen." "Well you are going to have to let her do what she wants," Sae says, "you can't hold on to her forever." "But I can't lose her again!" I exclaim. "I mean.. I can't lose… another person." Greasy Sae shakes her head. "You can't only love her because of the similar traits," Sae says, "I'm glad you've bonded, but you need to look at her differently." "That's not the only reason I love her," I say, "is it?" Greasy Sae shrugs her shoulders and gets up to leave.

"I'm glad you're getting along Katniss," she says, "but you need to find other things that you like about her. Not just the Prim things." She's right. I don't want to admit it, but she is. I need to forget Prim. No. Not forget her, but not let my life be ruined because of her death. That's what Peeta always said, anyways.

But I can't forget. It's not good to forget. If we forget, we let things happen again. So I won't forget. Simple. But I need to move on with my life. But I can't move on when I can't avenge her death. Someone killed Prim, and I never found out. But whoever killed her is probably someone who is killed now. If it was Coin, maybe I did already avenge her death. But the only way to know for sure is by figuring out who manned those helicopters.

And to find out who was in the one that killed Prim. But I'm going to have to get up and do something if I need to find out. And that means I'm going to have to go to District 13, where the army base is located. But I can't, I can't leave home. No, I have to. And I can find out where Peeta is too, or what happened to him. Oh why didn't I do this a long time ago? I won't be able to take a car to District 13, they'll take it away to make sure I haven't brought any weapons in it, and by the time they give it back to me it'll be turned into a skateboard or something.

I'll have to go on foot, through the woods, and sneak my way in there. Now after what happened with the Capitol, you're only allowed in District 13 if you're invited, or if you live there, or if you're the president. That's where all the security goes on, and where all the decisions are made for the government. They're so worried that someone is going to try to start a rebellion again, to get things back to the way they were.

But who would do that? Some Capitol person? It doesn't matter if they tried, because no one would support them. Maybe they're worried they'll be too powerful on their own, and blow up District 13 or something and take over. Well whatever it is, at least they do their job right. So it's decided then, I'm going to District 13.

I get up in search for Greasy Sae, ready to tell her the news. I search around for her, but fail to find her. "Sae," I holler, "Sae where are you?" I go upstairs and listen in to her bedroom. I hate being such a peep, but I need to talk to her about this. "Sae," I say as I knock on the door, "you in there?" "Yes Katniss, but I can't talk right now, I'm on the phone with an old friend. I'll talk to you later." I let out a sigh, and head on my way over to Haymitch's.

_Greasy Sae's P.O.V.:_

I hold the phone close to my side, making sure Katniss can't hear. I hear her sigh, and once I'm certain she's gone, I lift the phone back up to my ear. "Sorry Gale," I say, "so what can I do for you?"

_Katniss's P.O.V.:_

"Haymitch," I holler as I walk into his house, "let's talk again." "You were right," he says, "I'm not the only one who's survived a Hunger Games," he says as he motions his head towards the window. "Sorry," I say, "but it gets really annoying when no one pays attention to you when you're trying to do something." "Yeah," he says, "I've noticed sweetheart." "Are you better now?" I ask. "A bit," he says. "They've invented a new beer. You get over the hangover a lot faster. I'm still kind of dizzy though…."

"So Haymitch," I get straight to it, "I need to move on." "Well I'm glad you've finally realized it sweetheart," he says rolling his head around. "No Haymitch," I say, "I can't move on." "Then why are you telling me this?" he asks. "Because I want to avenge Prim's death," I say. "We're not starting another rebellion," he says, "not in my lifetime." "And I'm the one who's selfish," I mutter under my breath.

"I don't want to start a rebellion," I say. "Then what is it sweetheart?" he asks getting annoyed now. "Just get it over with." "I need to find out who was in that helicopter." "Well that's just unfortunate," he says while he stands up and walks over to the cabinet. He opens the door and pulls out a bottle of whine. He pops the cork off, and walks over to another cabinet to get a glass. "Because they're probably dead now," he says while pouring the dark red liquid into the glass.

I stomp over there and knock the glass out of his hand. "You're right," he says, "you really don't like it when people don't pay attention to you." "Haymitch," I say, "I need to settle things. I need to figure this out. I can't go on not knowing who was in that helicopter." There's a long pause before I continue. "And plus," I start, "I need to know what's happened to Peeta."

"Oh no Katniss," he says, "You aren't thinking…" "I am," I say. "Katniss," he says, "you'll never get in. There's no point! You think of the stupidest ideas, so just give up before you even start." "I may think of the stupidest ideas," I tell him, "but they always turn out right." "Katniss…"he starts, "no Haymitch," I say, "I'm going to District 13."


	2. Chapter 2: SAY GOODBYE

**Chapter 2: The World Formed**

_Nessie's P.O.V.:_

* * *

When I was little I always loved to write. I always had the best stories, and my teachers told me I was the best writer in the class. Even the whole family agreed my writing was amazing. The only problem was, I never knew how to begin my stories. I would sit in front of my computer staring for hours, and never could think of anything. Since I couldn't figure out what to write, I finally found a sentence that worked to begin all my stories.

It was, "The World Formed." It made the most logical sense to me. Nobody knows_ how_ exactly the world formed, but it formed _somehow_. Also, none of the stories I wrote could take place without the world forming first. If it's going to be in sequence, I figured you oughta' write the facts. I wrote it so much, that when I enrolled in the third grade my teacher made me stay after school to talk to me about it. She was concerned about me, and thought I had no knowledge about chronologic sequence.

I'll always remember that teacher. I hated her so much, because she was so boring! I know that teachers are good in what they teach, but this lady was _insane_ and _obsessed_. She thought literature was the best thing in the entire world. The day she had that talk with me was the day I decided just exactly how crazy she was. She also had an obsession with cats.

Ironic cause her name was Ms. Chirp. She always showed us pictures of her seventeen cats and how her newest cat would soon be having kittens. Every day when we watched morning announcements during the moment of silence she would always say, "If you're interested in buying on of my cat's kittens see me now." No one ever saw Ms. Chirp. We all liked cats, but I think because of Ms. Chirp everyone was afraid they'd become a crazy old cat lady. No wonder she wasn't married. I thought all of this to myself as I lay awake at 11:00 in the morning.

I turned over in my bed, trying to go back to sleep, but I couldn't. I closed my eyes and tried to remember the dream I had last night. My dream was a replay of when Jake and I had almost kissed on Monday night. I couldn't believe I almost did kiss him, but I didn't really have a problem if I did. My thoughts were interrupted when Aunt Alice quietly opened my door a bit to peek in. She gracefully stepped over and sat on the edge of my bed.

"Nessie," she said in a calming voice, carefully shaking me with her petite hands, "time to get up sweetie. It's makeover day!"

"Ugh," I groaned as I turned away from her. I forgot that today was Sunday. The week had gone by so fast. It seemed like only yesterday that I went to Jake's house. She let out a sigh.

"Oh Emmett!" she hollered. I immediately heard huge heavy steps stomp into my room.

I felt Emmett pull me out of my bed in one try, as I hit the ground hard with a big THUD! "What was that?" my mother immediately rushed in. Her eyes glanced from me on the floor to the big rock in the corner. "Emmett!" she yelled at him in her bell-like voice.

"Time to get up kiddo?" he said laughing as he ran out.

She rolled her eyes and laughed before she said, "Renesmee. You need to get up."

When everyone had left besides Aunt Alice she whispered to me, "Hey, at least you've been getting up earlier. Pretty soon you won't need to sleep at all," she said with a smile on her face. As she shut the door behind her, I dragged myself up from the floor and walked over to my dresser. I picked out a white tank and a navy mini-skirt with a pink floral design. First, I slipped on the tank over my bra in replace of my pajama top, and adjusted the straps so the bra would be hidden. Then, I took off my long rainbow checkered pants, and slid the skirt on so it went a teeny bit just past the start of my stomach, and tucked the tank in to look like a dress.

I slipped on some white Toms and walked into the kitchen. I smelled the delicious scent of my dad making eggs. "Hungry?" he asked in a frigid voice.

"Not really," I said ashamed. I loved my eggs, but my craving for human food had been going down with my sleep. He lifted the pan off the stove and shut it off.

He walked over to the garbage and was about to throw it away when my mom stopped him and said, "Wait! Don't throw those away!"

"Why not love?" he asked. He was always so kind to her.

"You make good eggs, I could-…"

His laughter cut her off. "Bella, love, you aren't human anymore."

He continued to throw the eggs away and threw the pan in the dishwasher. "Well that's a waste of eggs," he mumbled to himself.

"Sorry," I said feeling guilty.

"No it's fine," he protested seeming to forget that he wasn't the only one who had excellent hearing. "I should've known. Carlisle said you've improved greatly on your growth."

As I started to make my way to the couch, I was interrupted when Emmett rushed to my side. "Hey kiddo!" he said. "Wanna go arm wrestling? Best two out of three."

I opened my mouth to say something, when Alice rushed over and said, "Or, she can go shopping with me, and have a makeover day just like I promised." She took his hand that was in the arm wrestling position and moved it down to his side.

I was about to say something, when Jasper joined the party. "Those are quite lame," he commented. "How about a race instead?"

"Well I-…" I began. Then of course, you can't throw a party without Rosalie.

"Oh please! Leave the girl alone!" she defended. Rosalie had always treated me like her own daughter.

"Thank you!" I said in relief. "What she needs is a good etiquette lesson."

They all rushed into a debate about what I should be doing when I yelled, "MOM! DAD! CARLISLE! ESME?" All four of them came and broke up the argument.

"Now you all stop pressuring Nessie," Esme told them.

"She'll do what she wants," Carlisle said.

"Renesmee just ignore them," my mom told me. My dad made a sound of agreement with my mom and stayed glued to her side.

"Wait a minute," I said. "Why are you all in my house?"

"We were having a meeting while you were sleeping," my dad said.

"About what?" I asked.

"Oh you know," Alice said, "just the normal growth stuff."

"Oh," I said, but I knew they weren't telling the truth.

"So what's it going to be?" Emmett asked me going back to the subject with his arm formed back in a wrestling position.

"Nothing," I answered.

"Huh?" they all said.

"I don't want to do any of that stuff. I'm going to Megan's. See ya." I slammed the door shut behind me and sat in my car. I thought for a second about what I had just said. Did I say Megan's?

I meant Jake's. Too late now. If they thought I was doing anything suspicious I'd be grounded for LIFE. And that'd be forever. I started my car up and drove over to Megan's. I really didn't want to be there.

As I parked my car in her driveway, I opened the door and walked over to the front door. I rang the doorbell, and after a while knocked. I decided not to try again, because I was hoping I wouldn't have to go inside. I went back to my car and started it up. As I drove out of the neighborhood, I saw Johnny Leche walk by. I stared straight ahead, hoping he wouldn't notice me.

I forgot he lived in Megan's neighborhood. I kept looking ahead and tried to ignore him, but it's kind of hard to ignore someone who's screaming your name as loud as they can trying to beat out the roar of a car engine. I finally gave up and turned to look at him. "Hey Johnny," I greeted him as pleasantly as I could.

"Hey Ness!" That made me shudder. I didn't like the way that name sounded through his voice.

"What'cha doing here?"

"Just dropping off by Megan's," I informed him.

"Ah," he said. "I think they went to church today."

"Oh okay, thanks," I said about to take off.

"Wait Nessie!" he stopped me.

"Yes?" I asked loosing my patience.

"I was just wondering, if maybe, you'd want to go out sometime?" he asked with a look of self accomplishment of his face. Megan had told me he liked me, but I never believed it to be true. I had a crush on him once, but it had been over for a long time. I didn't understand how all my friends just started to like someone, so I thought maybe they had forced themselves into it by going on a date. So that's why I said yes.

I regretted it _so_ badly. Whatever. You make mistakes and learn from them. I drove home annoyed and looked at what time it was. 5:00. Time flies by. Why did Megan's neighborhood have to be hours away? But even then, how did it already get to five? Maybe it was because of the few side trips I took…and the shopping spree I went on…and the movie that I decided I _had_ to see…Anyways, he was coming at six.

When I got home, I went ahead and started up the shower, and got a white tattered towel while it was warming up. I set the towel on the white patched garden tub, and hopped into the shower. Just the right temperature. I got my hair wet, soaking it with the falling water, listening to the pitter patter sound it made when it hit the floor; I scrubbed some coconut shampoo into my hair. I rinsed all the suds out, and put some silky, creamy strawberry conditioner in. While I let it sit, I put some lavender body wash onto an old, blue body sponge.

I scrubbed my whole body with the soap, and then washed it all off; I watched as the silky white cream ran down from my body to the floor. I took the light purple razor from the shower rack and got the blade wet. I started with my legs, shaving all the hair off until it was completely smooth. After I moved to my underarms. Once I had finished, I shut off the shower and wrapped myself in the white towel. I sat on the garden tub ledge waiting to dry off a bit before I changed into my clothes.

"Knock knock knock!" I heard a soft voice say as Alice carefully opened the door. "May I come in?" she asked.

"Can you respect the word privacy?" I asked her back. She laughed a soft laugh, and came in anyways.

"Why are you getting all glammed up?" she asked. I didn't want to tell her that I had a date.

She would make such a big deal about it and give me a complete makeover. "I'm not," I lied. "I just felt dirty."

"Oh okay," she responded. "Just remember whenever you need a makeover you know where I'll be!"

"At _your_ house?" I asked hopefully.

She laughed and gracefully walked out on her tiny little feet. I removed the towel from my body and put on a one shoulder short black dress. I blow dried my hair and straightened it afterwards. I hated to admit it, but I was a girly girl. It was just who I naturally was, I just didn't want to become my aunt. I put a little bit of skin tone bronze eye shadow on, and then I put on a settle pink blush.

Now I only had one problem. I had to figure out how to get out of the house without anyone seeing me. I checked the time. 5:50 PM. Only ten minutes. I was trying to come up with a plan when all of a sudden I heard, "RENESMEE!"

"Yes?" I hollered down to my mother.

"WE'RE ALL GONNA GO HUNTING AND WE'LL BE BACK AT TEN OR SO!"

"OKAY!" I yelled back. Thank-God! Ten minutes after everyone left, I heard the doorbell ring that I was not looking forward to. I rushed down the few stairs from the house's bedrooms' hallway and opened the door.

"Hey," I said.

"Hey," Johnny said back, "You look pretty."

"Thanks," I said back. I didn't bother telling him he looked nice back, even though he did. His blonde hair wasn't short, but instead was shaggy, and he looked like a gentleman. I think I preferred when he was dressed in jeans and a t-shirt though, because he looked cuter. If I could turn him off, I would.

"May I come in?" he asked.

"Just a second let me go get my jacket and purse." With that I slammed the door in his face and went over to the closet. I hoped my actions would cause him to hate me. I opened the closet door and got my black cross body purse and a small cotton white shrug. I sighed and embraced myself for the worst night of my life. I was exaggerating.

It wouldn't be _that_ bad. I just wished I had saved my first date for someone more special. I opened the door and walked outside into his black truck. I didn't talk much in the car, more of listening to him telling me how he'd been wanting to ask me out for a long time, but never had the nerve too. When we finally parked, I noticed we were going to a small Italian Restaurant. Just great.

I loved Italian food, but there was no way I could eat spaghetti on a date. He got out of the car and opened the door for me like a proper gentlemen. I didn't bother saying thank you. He opened the next door into the restaurant for me too. I didn't say thank you for that either. We went up to the hostess and told her a table for two.

She was extremely tall, wearing black pants with a short sleeve black top and a white apron. Her red hair was curled, and she had too much blue eye shadow on. She led us all the way to the back of the restaurant, and as we walked I noticed it looked more like Chili's then a nice Italian place. All the people there were families, all of the same type. There would be a huge guy, I would assume as the dad, eating a lot while the mother lectured him to stop and the little kids would laugh. Or there would be a teenager listening to music while the younger child would cry, and the parents would yell at the teenager to spend time with the family.

As we sat down, I opened the menu and scanned my eyes across the pages looking for something to eat. "What looks good?" he asked trying to make conversation.

"I don't know yet," I said, "I just opened the menu…"

"Right," he said blushing a bit. A tall woman who looked about in her twenties came over to our table. She was wearing a short red dress with diamond earrings, and her blonde hair was waved down past her chest.

I hoped Johnny would stare at her and realize how much prettier she was in comparison to me, and tell me this wouldn't work out. Or so I could slap him and say, "How dare you!" Unfortunately Johnny was too polite to be a normal teenage boy. "Hi welcome to Varcinie's I'm Jessica and I'll be your server tonight. Can I start you two off with some drinks?"

"Can I get a coke?" Johnny asked.

"Sure thing," she said writing it down on her notepad. "And for you ma'am?"

"I'll just have a water please," I told her. I didn't want Johnny to have to pay for a drink I wouldn't drink, so that's why I just got water. "So you're on the football team?" I brought up trying to make conversation.

"Yeah," he said, "all the guy are stupid brainless rocks though."

I laughed. "Seriously," he said, "the only thing they understand is sports. And they all have these dumb blonde cheerleaders for girlfriends. I think the girls think they'll be popular by dating them, but to me their just idiots."

"I agree," I said. "I used to want to be a cheerleader when I was little. But now I'm glad I don't. I'd rather be dead than be on that squad." I guess I got my wish. I already was dead, so I was just living in paradise now.

"Yeah," he began, I love football, so that's why I'm on the team. I try to avoid talking to all the other guys." It was like Johnny had read my diary, because that's what I used to write about when I first started high school. Now that stupid popularity thing doesn't bother me anymore.

The waitress came over with our drinks, and put two straws on the table. "Have you decided what you'd like to eat tonight?" she asked in a friendly voice, looking at Johnny as she flipped her hair back shaking it down her back.

"I'll have the Portobello mushroom rigatoni," he said.

"I'll take the Chicken Parmesan Salad please," I told her. She made an sound like, "Mhmm," and tried to avoid giving me eye contact. I guess she didn't like competition.

Johnny and I continued to talk about school, and all the idiots in the world. It didn't go as bad as I thought, I actually was kind of enjoying it. We had a lot in common, so it was easy to talk to him casually. When the waitress sat down our food, my phone started vibrating. Jake. I hadn't thought about Jake at all the whole night, and I felt kind of bad.

"I'm sorry, but do you mind if I take this?; it's an emergency," I asked Johnny, knowing I would've taken it anyways if he had said no.

"Oh yeah of course!" he said. "Go right ahead."

"Thanks," I said as I got up and walked into the girls' bathroom. I pushed the door open right as I answered the phone and said, "Hey Jake."

"Nessie!" he said his voice sounding relieved. "I was wondering if you'd want to come over in a few minutes?"

"Sorry I can't right now," I told him. Originally, I would've said yes and told Johnny I was needed at home right away. But, I was actually having fun, and didn't want to leave.

"Why not?" he asked. Why couldn't Jake just have said oh okay and been done with it?

"I'm out right now," I told him.

"With who?" he questioned, his voice a bit panicked. For some reason, I didn't feel like I could tell Jake I was out with a guy. I didn't know why, I just couldn't.

"Megan," I lied.

"Oh, well maybe tomorrow?" he asked hopefully.

"Yeah definitely," I told him, but I couldn't promise.

"Kay well have fun," he said.

"Thanks, bye," I said and hung up. I felt bad, but I couldn't spend my whole life with Jake. I sat there holding my phone for a while, thinking to myself. I wondered who I'd end up marrying.

I couldn't marry a human, nor could I date a guy for a long time, or he'd start to get suspicious as I would have dramatic changes in my growth. Once I stopped growing, they'd get suspicious to why I looked the same and never changed. I supposed I could tell them I was a vampire, like my dad did with my mom, but it didn't seem that easy. I got so lost in my thoughts that I forgot I had a date to get back to. I put my phone back in my purse and walked back to the table. "Everything okay?" he asked.

"Yeah," I lied, "my mom just wanted to tell me she wouldn't be home till late, and needed to confirm what time I'd be home by."

"Oh okay," he said. Once we finished eating, we went back in his car and he drove me home. He walked me to my door and said, "I had a really nice time tonight."

"I," I began, "I did too," I said with a smile.

"Goodnight," he said.

"Night," I said back. He turned around to go back to his car, when he stopped and said, "Hey Ness?"

"Yeah?" I asked.

"Well, you see, I had a really nice time tonight. And this may be too soon, but I was wondering, only if you'd want to, I was wondering if you'd want to go out another time maybe?"

"Yeah," I said surprising myself, "I'd like that."

"Cool," he said, "I'll see you at school tomorrow."

"See ya," I said. He walked back up to me and kissed me on my cheek, then went back to his car and left. I unlocked my front door and walked in quietly. I stepped really carefully just in case anyone was home. I was about to walk up the few stairs when the hall lights were turned on.

"Oh no," I said.

"That's right," a fragile voice said.

"Caught?"

"Hell yeah," Aunt Alice said. "You weren't getting glammed up just cause you felt dirty!" she said. "You went out on a _date!_"

"Look, Alice it's nothing, it's just-..."

"Your first date!" she cut me off. "Why wouldn't you let me give you a makeover?"

I turned around to face her. "I didn't want you to go all out! I really didn't care that much about it."

"Go sit down," she told me pointing to the couch. I walked over to the quaint living room of our cottage. There was a dark green couch with a matching chair that extended out with a foot rest. In front of the couch was a fireplace, with a flat screen T.V. above it. I sat on the couch and waited for her to come over. She stepped carefully and sat down next to me.

Brushing out her skirt she said, "Just tell me next time. I promise I won't attack you."

"Okay," I said, but I didn't think I would.

"So where'd you go?" she asked.

"Varcinie's," I spit out.

"Oooh did Jake and you have a good time?" she asked wanting to know more.

"Yeah we"- I cut myself off hearing the name, "Wait _who_?"

"Jake," she said with a smile.

"Why'd you assume I went out with _Jake_?" I asked disgusted. Her face got a bit confused and then had a panicked look on her face.

"Did I say Jake? No no I just,"

"Aunt Alice!"

"Please dear just call me Alice," she said trying to change the subject.

"What's going on?" I asked her getting suspicious.

"Oh nothing I just…" she stopped to think about what to say next.

"And why are you here?" I asked. "You're supposed to be out hunting."

"Oh please Nessie," she said, "no one gets anything past me."

"Why'd you think Jake asked me out?"

"He hasn't yet?" she asked quickly covering her mouth.

"What?" I asked getting really freaked out now.

"Oh look Jasper's probably getting back now and I promised him I'd be home for him bye Nessie!" She quickly left the house without even letting me say a single word.

I ran up the three stairs into the hall extremely confused, and changed into my pajamas. I put some navy, soft shorts on and a white tank top. I lay on my bed trying to think. Why'd she assume Jake was on a date with me? And why'd she say he hasn't asked me out _yet_? Nothing made sense anymore.

While thinking to myself, I heard voices and the shutting of the front door. Everyone was home. Much earlier than expected too. It was only 7:30. I didn't bother going downstairs to say hi, so I fell asleep deep in thought. I dreamed about the date I was just on, except Johnny wasn't there. Jake was instead.

We were talking and laughing and having a great time. Then he took me home and we were about to kiss. Right when our lips touched, I woke up sweating. "Just a dream," I whispered to myself. I was really freaked out about this whole Jake thing. I checked the time.

1:30 AM. I smelled an unfamiliar scent coming from downstairs, so I decided to go investigate. I tip toed over to corner of the hall, and peeked out to see if I could spot who was there. I was about to go down into the living room when I saw a flash of Alice. What was she doing there? She had her cell phone in hand, and was staring at my parents on the couch.

"Come on pick up pick up!" her fragile voice whispered. I heard a mumbled sound come from the phone that I assumed was hello. It sounded groggy, so the person must have been sleeping. "Hey," she said.

"Who- is?" I heard.

"This is Alice," she answered in the phone.

"Oh shut up dog and listen to me," she snapped. "I don't think it worked." "Oh you know what I'm talking about!" she said a bit louder now.

"Shh!" my mother told her.

"Sorry," she mouthed. "Do I have to spell it out?" she said into the phone softer now.

"I-M-P-R"- "Yeah now you know what I'm talking about," she said in a sassy tone. "Well I don't think it worked mutt." I heard a loud chuckle come through the phone. "Well, she was on a date last night. D-A-T-E!"

"Mhmm that's right. I thought she would automatically go to you." "Well it looks to me that she's around the age where it happens," she told the person through the phone. She was talking about me. I don't know what her problem was, but I needed to figure out this whole Jake thing and I needed to figure it out soon.


	3. Chapter 3: Surprise I

**Chapter 3; SURPRISE I**

_Katniss's P.O.V.:_

Oh god I'm going to kill him. He's sentencing me to my death, right now, and in the cruelest way possible. But this time, the helicopter doesn't drop a bomb, instead, it drops itself. Or lands, anyways. The noise stops, and so do the flashbacks, but I still find myself frozen. Out of the helicopter comes a man. His red hair is buzz cut, highlighting his tan skin and square jaw.

He wears a v-neck light blue t-shirt, and a pair of dark jeans. "Katniss Everdeen," he says reaching his hand out. I reach mine out and shake his hand. "My name is Donner Jugs, and I'll be your first uh," he whispers the next part, "escort. I got my name from my aunt's last name when she re-married."

"Hi," is all I can say.

"Well we better get going," he says, "don't want to be late." He walks over to the passenger side door, and opens it for me. "After you," he says.

All I can do is stare at the door.

"Katniss?"

"Sorry," I say. I take his hand, and step up into the helicopter. He shuts the door, comes around to the other side, and turns the keys. He hands me a pair of headphones, and takes one himself.

"Put these on, this is how we can talk when we're up in the air." I do so, and he begins to turn the wheel and we start to take off. "So Katniss," he says, "you're going for two reasons eh?"

"Yes," I say, "were you told why?"

"Yes," he tells me, "and I don't blame you. Me being thirty seven, I have a wife and kids myself, and if something were to happen to one of them, I'd do exactly what you're doing. Now Katniss, even though District 2 is close to the capitol, the ride might be a tiny bit longer than you would expect, so I'm predicting that you'll arrive to your second escort's house by tomorrow afternoon."

"When is the train ride?" I ask.

"Early in the morning. Not tomorrow, but the next day. It'll still be dark when you leave for the train, that's what we always do."

"How long have you been working this job?" I ask.

"A few years now," he says.

"Why'd you get into it?" I ask.

"Well," he says, "my grandmother was from District 13. But she escaped to District 12. She had my mom there but they said that my grandmother wasn't responsible enough to take care of her, so they took my mom away, and my mom married a man there, and they had me. My grandmother never got to know my mom either, and they killed her husband. I was never told why any of that happened though. And then later my mom was pregnant with my sister, but they said she wasn't responsible enough for two children, so they took me away and I was raised by a foster parent in District 2. I never got to know my real parents.

"I just feel kind of tied to District 13 because of that, and I think it's unfair they won't let outsiders in. We need to prove to them that we're a better country now. Would you like a bottle of water or something?"

"Um sure I'll take one," I say. He reaches over and opens a cooler by his feet. He takes out a bottle of water and hands it to me. "Thanks," I say. I open up the water and say, "You said your grandmother moved to 12?"

"Yes I did," he says, "but I've never met her."

"Would you by any chance know her name?" I ask.

"I believe it started with a t or something," he says, "no maybe an s. Now let's see what was it, Soy? No. See? No."

"Was it….Sae?" I ask.

"Yes that was it! Sae!" He shouts. I become so shocked, and drop my water and it spills all over the floor.

"I am so sorry!" I say.

"It's fine," he says, "happens all the time."

He grabs some paper towels and cleans up the spilled water. "I know Sae!" I exclaim.

"Really?" He asks, "small world."

"She used to work at a marketplace and sell soup, but now she looks after my kids and is kind of our housekeeper."

"Are you serious?" he asks. "Katniss, I know this might be a lot to ask but, my mother died a while ago, and I don't know where my sister and dad are, I don't remember them, but Sae is the only person in my family left who I know where she is. Do you think that, when you get back, you could maybe call me and let me see her? I don't know what condition she's in."

"Very fine," I say, "but of course."

"Ah thanks you're the best!" He gets out a piece of paper and a pen, writes down his number, and hands the paper to me. And since you're doing me this favor, I'll do you one, any kind, any time, any where. No matter what. If you ever need me, just give me a call." "Hey you hungry?" he asks.

"Yeah a bit," I say, "but I mean, it's not like we can get lunch here."

"Well sure you can," he says, "what do you think I do every time?"

He opens a small little drawer by the wheel, and takes out a pill case. "What are you in the mood for?" he asks.

"Um, it doesn't matter," I say. He shakes out two pills, one that has a brown stripe, then a red stripe, and then a yellow stripe. The other one has a green stripe, than a purple stripe, then an orange stripe, and last a brown stripe. He hands me the second one, and takes the first one for himself.

"Just pop in your mouth," he says, "and don't chew it or swallow it."

I do as he says at the same time he does, and the pill dissolves on my tongue. My tongue is filled with a great flavor, it tastes like chicken salad, with onions, carrots, croutons, shredded cheese, bacon bits, and dressing. "Mmm," I say. But then not only do I taste it, but my stomach starts to feel full, as if I just ate.

"What is that?" I ask.

"Nutrition tablet," he says, "highly addictive, that's why I only take them once in a while, but for my passengers, they can take them a few times, because it won't hurt. Sometimes I make sure I've made food though and have it in a cooler."

"The tablet has the same nutrition that the food it represents was. You had salad, so it filled you with the same amount of sugars, fats, and calories that specific salad would have. I had a slice of pizza, so it's the same with me."

"That's amazing," I say, "I don't think we have those in District 12."

"That's because us escorts came up with it," he says, "Or, our boss did. He's a genius, and has made a lot of money with this business."

"Does your boss live here?" I ask.

"Yeah," he says, "as a matter of fact, he's working tomorrow, so he's going to be your second escort, and you can ask him all about it then."

"Cool," I say. "So what about your dad and sister?" I ask as we keep flying on.

"I don't really know," he says, "my sister was about your age I think, but I don't know if my dad even lives in District 12 anymore. I do know that he got remarried, but, who knows where he is now."

"Do you know _their_ names?" I ask.

"No," he says, "or not my dad's anyways. My sister's name was Madge." I hope these were the surprises Haymitch was talking about, because otherwise there's going to be too many for me to handle.

"Madge?" I ask, "I knew her too! I didn't know that Greasy S- I mean, Sae was her grandmother. I don't think she knew either, considering she never got to raise your mom."

"You knew her?" he asks with a smile, "do you still see her too? Do you think I could see her too when I come?"

"Um, I _did_ know her," I say, "but there was a bombing in District 12 and-…."

"Oh," he cuts me short. I turn my head to the window and try not to cry.

Everything is making sense now. He said he was named after his aunt's last name once she got remarried. She must be Maysilee Donner, the one who passed down the mockingjay pin. I just can't believe that they were all connected. Sae always did have a soft spot for Madge. Madge. I almost forgot about her. Just another person to add to my nightmare list. And her father and mother, too. I want to curl up and cry, but I promised myself this would stop. It's going to stop, after all this is over.

"What about my mother?" he asks, "and my father?"

"When I visited District 12 after the bombing," I say, "this guy named Thom, was outside of their house, your dad was the mayor you know, and the house was burnt down. He said he hadn't seen any of them since the bombing."

"Oh," he says again.

"Well, at least you have your grandmother," I say in an un-cheery voice. I can't be cheery right now, not with all of my sorrow too.

"Yeah," he says, "at least." "I'm sorry," he says, "I shouldn't be upset with everything that's happened with me, when so much more has happened to you."

"It's fine," I lie. I spend the rest of the ride mourning in silence, while staring out the window down below. I imagine what Snow's human shield must have looked like from above. But why would anyone bomb children? I just don't see any reason for it.

I wish everyone was still alive. And I wish Madge were still here. She could help me through my dark times. So could Cinna. Why, almost all of them could. And poor Annie, with Finnick dying, she had to raise a child all on her own from the start. I wonder how they are doing now. I just want this all to be over with. I want it to be tomorrow afternoon already so I can just go to my second escort's house. What if I did runaway with Gale? Taken our families? Prim wouldn't be dead. Or maybe she would, but that means we'd probably all be dead too, or Avoxes.

Would it have turned out better? But then I wouldn't be with Peeta, but maybe I'd be happy with Gale in the woods. We would've had kids of our own, and just live in our favorite place. No, because then there wouldn't be a rebellion, and we'd surely get caught. The path I chose was the right path. Before I know it, night has already fallen, and I'm growing tired.

"Hungry?" Donner asks.

"Little bit," I say trying to stay awake.

"Here," he says while handing me a yellow pill. I pop in my mouth and suck on it, and I start to taste chicken noodle soup.

Donner seems to be able to sense emotions, because chicken noodle soup is just what I needed. The soup makes me feel warm and comfortable inside, and calms me down a bit. My eyes start to close, and I'm about to fall asleep when I realize it.

"Oh!" I say as I quickly open my eyes.

"It's okay," Donner says, "you can sleep."

"But what about you?" I ask, "I don't want to make you feel upset."

"It's fine," he says, "I've been doing this for a long time now, I've got my methods."

"Okay," I say. So with that I ask no more questions, close my eyes, and drift off to sleep.

"Fire," a woman's voice says calmly. "Fire." The word echoes around. "Fire. Fire fire." A pair of eyeballs show up, staring at me with a scared expression. They look frozen, as if they know if they move I'll hurt them.

"I won't," I try to say, but the person that the pair of eyes belong to doesn't hear me.

"Oh my god," I say, but before I can say anything else, the eyes launch at me, and all I can see is a face. The face has long pink hair raging from it, and the emerald eyes now fit into the face.

The lips are pure white, and the face just stares at me. All of a sudden it makes a creepy hissing sound, and I scream. But the scream isn't mine, it's Prim's.

"Katniss!" she screams, "Katniss!" all of a sudden Prim's voice turns into Peeta's, and he repeats the same thing.

"Katniss! What are you doing? Go! Get out of here! Katniss! Can you hear me? Katniss! Go! Katniss!"

"Katniss!" Prim's voice reappears.

"Katniss!" But then she says something un-expected, "Wake up!"

My eyes quickly open to Donner shaking me. "Huh?" I ask rubbing my eyes.

"You kept screaming 'no' in your sleep. You must have had a nightmare."

"Oh," I say. I rub my eyes again and look out the window. The sky is clear, and the sun is just rising. "What time is it?" I ask. He pulls up his left hand at looks at the golden banded watch on his wrist.

"Six in the morning," he says. "Your second escort is just getting back to his house from leading someone else to the train by now."

"Wow," I say, "what time do we leave?"

"What time do you _leave_?" Donner repeats with a laugh, "that's nothing compared to what time you get _up_." I take a big gulp. "Let's get some breakfast in you," he says, "it's going to be a while till you get to the house. I'll give you lunch too. We're a bit off schedule, so you might end up arriving there at evening instead of the afternoon now."

"That's fine," I lie. Donner reaches into his bag of pills and takes out a few different ones. One yellow one with golden brown ends, one with different shades of reds, one light brown pill, and one dark brown pill.

He hands me them all. "All of this?" I ask.

"Yep," he says, "we want to try to keep you full for as long as we can, so you won't get so addicted to the pills.

"But isn't this enough to get me addicted?" I ask.

"Oh no," he laughs, "not nearly." So I start out with the yellow pill with golden brown lining. My mouth is filled with the taste of scrambled eggs, and then my stomach. Next I try the pill that has the different shades of reds. It tastes just like well-done bacon. I try the light brown pill, which tastes like pancakes, and as full as I am, shove the dark brown pill in my mouth, which is toast-flavored.

I feel so stuffed, that the thought of eating makes me sick.

"Okay, we're about to land," Donner says. Just great. Now I'll probably throw up. "Afterwards I have a car waiting for us, then I'll drive us down to your other escort's house." "Prepare for landing," he says. He moves some sort of stick shift back, and starts turning the wheel backwards. We slowly start moving down, and below us is a parking lot. There's only one car there, and it's a large blue truck. We land right in the middle of the lot, and I'm about to throw up. "And we're back on the ground," he says. I hold my puke back in.

He takes his headset off and I take mine off as well. He opens his door, gets out, and comes around the other side to open my door for me. I take his hand as I step down, and he shuts the door behind me.

"This way," he says. I follow him over to the truck, and he opens the passenger door for me. I hop into the car and plop down on the black leather seat. It feels good to be back on ground.

"Alright," his voice startles me from the left. I notice he's already made his way to the driver's seat.

He starts up the car and starts driving.

"You know how everything's gonna go right?" he asks.

"Yes," I say, "Sae already went over it with me."

"Good," he says. He turns the radio on, I just listen to songs for the whole car ride. We both really don't have much to talk about anymore; I think we're both still kind of upset from yesterday. Later in the afternoon he hands me a pill, and I take it without asking any questions. It tastes like some kind of noodles, but I really don't care. We keep driving, and as we do the songs get worse and worse, so he just turns them off.

I look at the time: 6:30 PM.

"We're almost there," he says, "I just wish his house was closer. But it's for safety." At exactly 6:50 we arrive into a neighborhood. He keeps driving, and stops at the 12th house on the left.

"Here we are," he says. "Now Katniss, I can't go out and walk you in from here, it's too dangerous. But I just wanted to tell you that I wish you the best of luck, and please, be careful. It can get wild out there."

"I will Donner," I say, "I promise. Thanks for everything." We reach over and hug each other, and with a sigh, I open the door and step out. I walk over to the house's driveway, wave one more time, and keep walking. Right as I get to the front door I turn back around, but the car is already gone. I stare up at the house. It's average sized, with white paint and a black roof. It looks cozy, and has a nicely cut lawn with flowers growing everywhere.

I take on deep breath, and knock on the door. "Coming," a woman's voice says. The golden knob starts to turn, and out comes a small woman. She is wearing black pants with black sandals, and a green sweater. She has straight, smooth blonde hair that stops a little bit past her breasts, and wears two silver rings around her right hand ring finger, one with diamonds encrusted all around, the other with one big diamond right in the middle.

"Hello," she start's to say, "You must be-…" she cuts herself off when she looks up, and her pink lips freeze. She has emerald eyes, and they're locked right on me. The same eyes I saw in my dream. This gives me the jitters, but I know this is merely a coincidence.

"Who's at the door?" a warm, familiar man's voice says. The woman doesn't respond for a while.

Once she is able to find the words, after a long pause she responds, "The girl on _fire_."


	4. Chapter 4: SURPRISE II

**Chapter 4; SURPRISE II**

Damn you Haymitch. When I get back and get my hands on him, I swear I otta kill him. It seems like the most logical thing to do. Why? Why, why why? Why couldn't he just tell me? Of course any normal person would think I'm overreacting, for everyone knows who I am, so this whole "girl on fire thing" could just mean that the man asking who was at the door is a big fan of me or hates my guts or something. But please, that would just be way too easy, so that would never be my situation. Really, when you put all the facts together, it makes a whole lot of sense. The woman remains frozen, and behind her comes a man. "Who's at the doo-…" he starts to ask while looking down at her. But then he looks up, and his eyes meet mine.

"Katniss," Gale says.

"I must have the wrong address," I say as I look at the paper.

I start to turn around, hoping that I'm right, but then he says, "Wait."

I turn back around to face him, and he says, "you don't have the wrong address I'm your escort." I hate you Haymitch. So this was the fancy job Gale got in District 2. So he's the boss of this business. So he's married now. The woman un-freezes and invites me in. Without saying anything else, she turns around and walks in. But Gale and I linger there for a moment, just staring at each other.

"Coming?" she asks. I quickly come back to reality and walk past Gale into the house. He follows us in, and the woman tells Gale to take my bag to my room. He takes it from me and does as she says.

"I'm Lailla," she says while reaching out her hand to shake mine, "Gale's wife."

I shake her hand and nod and say, "I don't suppose I need to introduce myself," I say with a slight smile.

"No," she agrees. "Would you like anything to drink, or eat?" she asks.

"No thanks," I tell her. She's being awfully nice for someone who was probably told horrible stories about how awful I am. I figured she'd hate me for hurting her husband or something.

"Well then," she says, "if that's all, I must be going."

"Where to?" I ask as she goes over to the coat rack to grab her coat.

"Every time Gale has to do this, I spend the night at a friend's, because it's too dangerous. I already have my stuff in the car ready to go."

"Oh," I say.

"Well feel free to make yourself comfortable," she says, "and good luck." She shuts the door behind her, and gets off on her way. I walk over to the small green love seat that's facing the fireplace, and the flat screen above it. There's a glass coffee table with brown outlining, and to my left is a matching green armchair. There's some white counter tops, but then they open up to an open kitchen. The place is carpeted, and after the kitchen is a long carpeted hallway with a white door at the end. To the right is a stair case with wooden railings, and wooden steps.

Gale comes down heavily, his feet making a loud noise with every step. "Do you want like, water, or something?" he asks trying to make small talk.

"No thanks," I say.

"Squirrel meat?" he jokes.

"No," I say not joking back, "I've had plenty." There's a long pause of awkward silence between us. "Did Haymitch and Greasy Sae set you up to this?" I finally break the silence while turning around on the couch to see him leaning against the wall.

"Well, Sae called me a while ago," he says, "and she said she knew you were going to ask to do this, and she wanted to make sure my schedule was clear so I could be your escort. She said that she knew she could trust me."

"I'll kill them," I mutter to myself. But I'm pretty sure he hears me, because he looks down to the floor. "So," I say, "how long have you been married to Lailla?"

"Five years," he says. He's twenty-eight now, so he got married to her when he was twenty-three, the same age that I had Ivy at.

"Do you have any kids?" I ask.

"No," is all he says.

"Can I be shown to my room?" I ask getting up. He nods and starts walking upstairs. I follow him, and in the hallway he takes me to the first door on our left. He opens it up and lets me in.

"This is your room," he says.

"If you need anything, I'll be in my room, which is right over there." He points his finger to the very last door at the end of the hallway, right in the middle.

"Thanks," I say. I walk into my room and shut the door behind me. The walls are green, and there's a double bed with a green and brown comforter. Across from it is a wooden bureau, and a small television on the top. To the right of the bed is a matching wooden dresser, and on the left a pair of double doors that have a closet, and on door that leads to a bathroom.

I decide to go take a shower and change my clothes. I dig through my bag and find another pair of jeans, and a black t-shirt. It has purple cursive letters on it, and the letters have purple flames coming out of them. The shirt simply says, "_Flame."_ I grab some underwear and another bra, lock the door, and walk into the bathroom. I set down the clothes on the garden tub ledge, and grab a towel from the bathroom closet, and set it down next to the clothes.

I turn on the shower, and jump in. The room starts to become hot, and the glass is steamy from the water. I start out by taking some maple scented shampoo and scrub it in my hair. I've never liked those fake ocean breeze type spelling shampoos. I've always liked the natural ones. So I rinse the shampoo out, and scrub in a regular conditioner. There's a brand new razor in a box, which I'm assuming is Lailla's. I feel bad using it, but she can buy more. So after I soap down I start shaving.

I don't know why, because I hate shaving, but today I feel like it. This shaver is much better than mine, and I'm not getting cut, so I decide that I'll keep it. It's not stealing, I used it after all. And I'm sure Lailla won't know the difference. I reach over and turn off the shower, and step out and wrap the towel around me. This is too much, being here, at Gale's. I'll just go to bed and wake up in the morning, then be on my way, and I won't have to see Gale ever again. But, I kind of, want to. I don't want to leave again on an un-happy note. I want to talk to Gale and figure things out.

But it doesn't seem he feels the same way. I dry off, and then slip on my under garments first, then my jeans, and lastly pull over my fitting t-shirt. There's a black blow dryer in a floral bag hanging on the door, so I blow dry my hair into a wavy style, and pull it in front. Once I'm done, I grab the razor from the shower and throw it my bag. I look at the time; it's already 7:30. I can't go to bed this early, I'll never fall asleep. So I just plop down on the bed, and think about what I should do. I just can't believe I'm here. Gale. Married.

Time flies. I can't help but feel a little anger towards him and his wife. "It's called jealousy sweetheart," Haymitch would say. But I'm not jealous. Am I? No of course not! Why would I be jealous? I decide to just go get up and talk to him, because I need things settled. This is part of my moving on, so I just, need this. I open the door and walk down to the end of the hallway. I hesitate at first, but then I go ahead and knock on the door.

"Come in," Gale says. I open the door and find Gale sitting on his bed. He's holding a red book in his hand, and it seems to have the same gold peeking out of it that Ivy's book did.

He sets the book aside and looks at me.

"I was just wondering what time we're leaving tomorrow," I lie, "so I know what time to get up at."

"Two in the morning," he answers quickly.

"What?" I ask.

"You need to be up by 2," he says, "we're leaving at 3."

"Oh wow," I say.

"Yeah," he says, "you get used to it though."

"Oh, well okay," I say.

I turn around and start to leave, but then he says, "Katniss." I turn around and look at him, and he motions for me to come towards him. So I walk over and sit criss-crossed on the end of his bed at the edge. "Do you ever regret things?" he asks.

"What kind of things?" I ask.

"Like what happened," he starts, "between us."

"Sometimes," I answer honestly, "I miss how it used to be, between us."

"Me too," he says, "and I can't help feeling, that it was my fault."

"I mean," I start, "you just left me. You didn't even say goodbye or where you were going. If it wasn't for the others in 12 I wouldn't have known. You just stopped talking to me."

"I guess I was…..jealous," he spits out.

"Of?" I ask.

"Peeta," he admits shyly.

"Gale," I say, "you had four years. You met me when you were fourteen. Why did you never tell me?" "Because," he says, "I didn't realize it until I was seventeen. And I knew you didn't feel the same way."

"Well, maybe I did," I say. He looks up and raises his eyebrows. "But I…didn't," I say feeling mean. "Sorry," I say, "I didn't mean for it to come out that way."

"It's okay," he says rubbing the back of his head. "I knew you didn't want to have a relationship anyways, because of the Hunger Games and all."

The name makes me shiver. I get up from the bed and say, "Well, I better go to bed."

"Wait," Gale says as he gets up from behind me. We stand there for a moment, just staring at each other, but then he pulls me in, and hugs me. This surprises me at first, but then I get used to it, and hug him back.

"I missed you Catnip," he whispers. We pull away, but neither of us move. We just stay put, staring at each other again. All of a sudden, he pulls me in again, but this time, not for a hug. This time, he kisses me. He pushes his lips against mine, and closes his eyes. This shocks me at first, but then I close my eyes, and push back. I don't know what else to do, so I just go with it. He pulls me tighter to him, and I wrap my arms around his neck. I feel tense and stressed, and he must sense it because he whispers in my ear, "Relax Catnip." Oh crap. His hushed voice sends chills down my spines, which freezes me. That always freezes me. Peeta does it all the time. Now I know I'm screwed, because I'm frozen, and can't find the will to push away.

He presses his lips against mine harder and I press mine back. He curls his fingers through my hair. I know this is bad. This is very bad. I need to stop. But I can't. I'm completely and utterly frozen. But then something else happens. "Katniss," Gale says.

"Yes?" I ask.

"I love you."


	5. Chapter 5: ENDLESS SURPRISES

**AUTHOR'S NOTE:**

**Hey guys! Sorry it's taken me so long to update this chapter! I have four stories out that I'm trying to update chapters on, plus other ones that I'm currently working on to try to publish as well, so I've been really busy! Assure you not, I'll always update though, no matter how long it takes, don't worry, I'm not finished with this story! There's a lot more to come! (Ooooh!) Sorry though, I'll try to update as soon as I can! I'm almost done writing Chapter 6 right now, so hopefully I'll have another one out for you soon! Thanks for being loyal and great readers! Enjoy this chapter! I'm sure there'll be some surprises...**

**-FallingFantasy**

* * *

**Chapter 5: Endless Surprises**

* * *

I wake up early in the morning to the sound of an alarm clock beeping. I look at the time, _2:00 AM. _I turn my head over to my right, and see Gale laying down next to me, with his arm over me. "Oh my god!" I yell as I remove myself from him and sit up. I look down and realize I'm fully clothed, luckily.

"What? What?" Gale asks as he quickly rubs his eyes and gets up. He shuts off the alarm clock and looks at me. "What's wrong Catnip?" he asks stroking my hair. I slap his hand away and move away from him. "Katniss?" he asks.

"I can't believe that you kissed me!" I start.

"Oh," he simply says.

"Gale!" I say. I take my hand and slap him.

"Ouch," he says rubbing his cheek, "Katniss what's wrong with you?"

"I can't believe you did that!" I say.

"I'm, I'm sorry?" he asks.

"Yeah you are!" I say angrily.

"Katniss, I couldn't help myself..." he says.

"That's sick Gale," I say.

"You didn't stop me," he says.

"But you're married! And I'm married…"

"Katniss," he says, "I'm not in love with Lailla."

"What?" I ask confused.

"I don't even know why she's still with me," he says, "she wants a family. I don't. She wants to spend more time with me. I don't want to spend more time with her."

"Have you even kissed her?" I ask disgusted.

"Yes," he says, "but I don't much anymore."

I slap him again.

"What was that for?" he asks.

"For making me feel even worse! Clearly if she's stayed with you after you've just rejected her and pushed her away, then she still loves you!" I say.

"Katniss, I don't feel good about it either, but you kissed me back." I don't say anything, because I know he's right. "Katniss, I know you came here to move on from Prim and everything, but I never moved on either. I needed to move on from you, and that's what I needed. I needed to just get one more kiss."

"But you're not moved on," I say.

"I am," he says, "just not from you. I can't move on. I have to move on from my relationship now and realize I can't hide it by staying with Lailla."

"No Gale," I say getting up. "You _have_ to move on from _me_." I run out of the room and into my bedroom. I quickly undress, replace my old clothes with my hunting outfit, and grab all my things and run downstairs. Soon Gale runs after me.

"Katniss wait!" he yells.

"Let's just go!" I say.

"Katniss you can't just run!" he shouts after me. He finally catches up with me and gets a grip on me.

"Let go!" I say.

"No Katniss," he says, "look I'm sorry! It wasn't right! But you just don't understand!"

"I do understand," I say, "now which way are we going?"

"Katniss stop," he says, "you shouldn't be mad at me! You could've pushed me away, but you're the one who kissed me back!"

"I couldn't help that," I say.

"And I couldn't help it either!" he says. "If you don't like it then just…forget it," he says, "but I know I won't."

"I can't just forget it Gale!" I say, "it'll always be there now, eating me away from the guilt."

"Then don't forget it," he says, "you just don't have to tell."

"Gale I don't see why you aren't as upset about it!"

"Because," he tells me, "I don't have anyone else that I love to feel the guilt."

"But I do!" I say, "that's why I'm here, to find him!"

"I'm sorry," he says releasing his grip, "It was just a kiss. My fault again. As it always is. Let's just go." He walks down to the end of the hall where the closet door is. "Come on," he says. I walk over and he opens the door, and I see that it's not a closet, but a basement.

I follow him down the steps of the basement. It looks like a normal finished basement, so I have no clue to as why we'd be here. He walks over to the red leather couch and sits down. "Sit," he says.

"I'm good," I tell him.

"Then you're not going," he says. I give in and sit next to him on the couch. He presses his hand on the table, and all of a sudden a hologram comes up. It has a green hand shape with lines going across it.

He presses his hand on it, and green holographic lines come across his hand. "Access accepted," an automated voice says. The holograph disappears, and all of a sudden the couch is flipped over and we are sitting on a different couch somewhere else. "Welcome to the underground," he says. The new couch is a boring grey color, and so are all the walls and floors. "We made everything camouflage just in case," he says. "Come on, this way." I follow him underground, every step making an echo.

The place is so empty, it's starting to give me the creeps. We keep walking, but there's no people, or furniture anywhere. I look at my watch and see that it's 2:30.

"I thought we were going to leave at 3," I say.

"We were," he says, "but you decided we'd go early."

"When does the train leave?" I ask.

"Whenever you arrive," he says. I'm so tired, I'm not used to being up this early. I just want to go crawl back into bed and go to sleep. I'm practically falling asleep as we walk, and I'm starting to go slower. Gale stops and turns around.

"Keep going," he says.

"Huh?" I ask rubbing my eyes. He rolls his eyes and picks me up without notice.

"No put me down!" I yell at him. He does as I say, and I keep my eyes open so I can keep walking. In thirty minutes, I slowly start to hear more noise, and I know the train must be close by.

"Right here," he says. We come to a stop and right in front of me, is a big, metallic, grey train covered in charcoal. I open my bag and take out my bow and arrows. I throw the bag of arrows over my shoulder and clutch the bow under my arm. "You brought that?" He asks.

"Of course," I say, "it's my signature item."

"Katniss!" he says, "they won't let you on the train with that!"

"Well you're the boss so you can give them the okay."

"No, I can't," he says, "I told them if I were ever to go against the rules, don't let it happen because I might be being threatened." I roll my eyes at him and put the arrows and bow back in the bag. "Still can't bring it," he says. "How'd you manage to get it on the other train anyways? Their security's even better than ours because it's 13 run."

"Cause I'm smart," I say, "and I know how to hunt." I walk forward with my bag to the train's platform. I see a man dressed in a grey jumpsuit; he has slick brown hair and his face is covered in charcoal. "I need a ticket," I say. Gale reaches to the backpack over his back and takes out one. He hands it to me and then goes back in his pack to get something else.

"Ticket?" the ticket man asks. "Looky here, our very own catni- I mean, flaming girl, or something like that, right?" he asks trying to act cool as if he doesn't know my name.

"Girl on fire," I correct him.

"Right, right," he says. "Kay well since you're here we'll start leaving. Your room will be #483."

"Anyone else on the train?" I ask.

"Of course not," he says, "too dangerous. Just us crew and you. We always take one passenger at time to 13. Now come on come on." I walk onto the train and find myself in a small room. There's a conveyer belt and a scanner, but no one manning it. I place my bag on the conveyor belt and it goes through, but it doesn't even seem like the scanner went on.

"Kay thanks man," I hear the ticketman say behind me. I grab my bag and turn around, and see Gale coming on.

"What are you doing?" I ask panicked.

"Sae didn't tell you?" he asks.

I move my eyes to the left and right and then say, "Uh, no…"

"Oh," he says, "I'm coming with you."

"No way," I say, "there has to be some sort of mistake!"

"She asked me personally so you would be safe," he says.

"Well I don't want you here," I say. I quickly walk away to my room, but he follows me in.

"Get out," I say.

"Katniss I don't understand you," he says shutting the door behind him. "One minute you're kissing me and the next your telling me to get out and avoiding me."

"Because I don't want you here!" I say.

"Clearly you did when you kissed me!" he says.

"No, you kissed _me_," I say.

"Doesn't matter," he says, "you kissed me back. Clearly you like me enough if you did. You can't just avoid your problems Katniss."

"I can do whatever the hell I want to Gale Hawthorne and you can't stop me from that."

"Katniss!" he shouts at me. He walks over to me and gets closer. I take out my bow and arrow point it at him.

"Get away," I say. Before I can move Gale's taken the bow and arrow and has me locked in his arms holding the bow and arrow higher than I can reach.

"Let…go…." I say trying to shove out of his arms.

"You've seem to forgotten that I'm taller, stronger, and faster than you," he says with a smile. "Katniss, stop acting like you hate me just because you feel guilty. You can't get rid of the guilt by avoiding me."

"I'm not-…" I start, but he interrupts me and says, "I don't buy it. I know you, and you don't handle your problems well."

"Nor…do..you," I say still trying to free myself from his arms. His grip gets tighter on me.

"You're never going to get away," he whispers in my ear.

"Stop that!" I say slapping his face away.

"Look Katniss," he says, "all I know is you wouldn't have kissed me back if you didn't feel something too."

"Gale, stop trying to tell me how I feel, I'm married!"

"Married to a guy who is lost, and you feel sad without him. I'm married too. But maybe you've moved on, and maybe…"

"Stop it!" I yell, "Gale that's not it at all! You just don't understand people and never have! I'm sorry if your relationship is going well, but I'm in love with _Peeta_, not _you._"

Cold tension fills the air, and Gale slowly lets go of me. "I don't know why you'd kiss me then…" he says, "and make me think…you know what Katniss? It's not all about you. How do you think I feel? You completely played me and made me think you had feelings for me. Why would you do that?" he asks.

"I don't know Gale," I say, "I couldn't help it…"

"That's not an excuse," he says, "that's how I felt. So don't blame me when you say that too. I don't know about you Katniss, but I felt something. I don't regret kissing you, because to me, it was great. And I figured that since you kissed me back, that you wanted to. Not just out of comfort."

"It wasn't out of needing comfort," I say.

"Then what was it out of?" he asks angrily. He balls his hands into fists and paces around.

"Gale don't get so-…"

"No Katniss!" he yells, "this is why I get angry! Because of you! What was it out of it wasn't out of comfort? Cause you've made it clear that it wasn't out of love!"

"I don't know," I say, "Gale stop you're scaring me."

"You don't know," he says softer turning his hands back to normal. "Of course not. You never know."

"I did it," I say, "to move on. I never knew my feelings for you. I guess I used to have them for you, but I just needed to clear it up in my mind to move on."

"So basically," he says, "you wanted to revisit the past when you had feelings for me, and kissed me because that's what you would've done, and now that you got the kiss, you've reassured your feelings, know you don't feel that way, and you're done."

"Gale it's not like that," I say.

"Then what is it like?" he asks calmly. "And what about me Katniss?" he asks. "What if I'm not done? What if I'm not ready to move on?"

I remain silent for a long time. "Then maybe," I say, "maybe I'll let you kiss me one more time. For moving on."

"Maybe," he echoes. I walk over to the double bed and sit down. He follows over with me and sits down on the other side of the bed.

"You can go to your room now," I say.

"Thing is," he says, "this is my room."

"What?" I ask turning to look at him.

"There's only one room per train, to make sure they only take on passenger. If the escort chooses to go with the passenger they have to share a room. Usually there's a couch."

I sigh and turn back around to face the wall. "Attention Passenger," a voice says, "we will be leaving now for your trip." All of a sudden the train starts, and I hear a loud noise. We start going, and I feel the movement below me.

"Trains aren't as good either," I mutter under my breath. "Do these windows open?" I ask.

"Yeah, why?" he asks.

"I think I'm gonna be sick," I say rushing to the window. I open it up and stick my head out, hoping to breath fresh air and see trees, but instead I just see darkness. We must be in the underground tunnels.

The only other thing I see is the light of the train reflecting on the wall, and occasionally glowing eyes of a rat or rarely a cat. I look down, and then I puke.

"Don't think I want to kiss you now," Gale laughs silently.

"Shut up," I yell from the window. The rest of the day is a drag. Gale just keeps reading his book, and I just keep staring out the window. I only puke twice, but then I take a shower and rinse out my mouth multiple times to clean myself up. A woman serves us breakfast, lunch, and finally dinner, with normal amounts of food rather than the monster sizes that the 13 trains give you.

Gale seems to finally finish his book, and puts it away in his bag. I grab my pajamas out of mine and go to the bathroom to change. I put on grey and silver plaid long pants and slip over a teal camisole. I've finally calmed down from the whole Gale thing, and have decided that maybe I was being a little harsh on him. I walk out of the bathroom, and sit back down on the bed. "Look Gale," I say, "I'm sorry. I'm not good at dealing with my problems, and I was too hard on you. I didn't mean to say the whole 'not loving you' thing like that. It wasn't supposed to come out that way."

"I'm sorry too," he says, "I sometimes wish you chose me, and I just wish that's how you would feel, so I make up crazy things in my head." I turn around to look at him, and this time, I hug him.

"I just wish we could be back to normal," I say, "can we at least do that? Is that good enough?"

"I wish," he says, "I just can't help my feelings," he says, "and truthfully Katniss, if we find Peeta, and things go back to normal, I don't know if I can handle to be around you."

I nod my head, and try to hold back my tears. "Katniss," he says, "I don't know if you still will, but about that kiss-…" before he can finish I pull him close to me and kiss him. I press my lips to his, and he presses back, with a soft touch, yet forceful. We pull away, and I say, "better?" He just gulps. Of course it's not. Because now it leaves him wishing he had more. So I pull him back to me, and press my lips against his again. But I know he still isn't moved on. But before I can finish he pushes me away.

"No Katniss," he says, "no more regret. Our fight will just happen all over again."

"No Gale," I say, "this time, I _want_ to kiss you." I resume to press my lips to his, but he pushes me away again.

"Katniss, you're just going to have more guilt and regret."

"But _you_ won't," I say.

"Katniss," he says, "no. You'll just blame it on me again and ask me why I didn't stop you. So this is me stopping you."

"Gale, please," I say.

"No Katniss," he says firmly. "You're going to find Peeta, and you'll regret it even more."

"And what if I don't?" I ask getting worried.

"If you don't," Gale says, "then you can come back to me, and then I'll accept your lips."

"Gale," I say, "how many people exactly have gone on this trip?" I ask.

"About five-hundred," he says.

"And how many have made it back?" I ask. "About..twenty," he says. "No wait, fifteen." I open my mouth and then he says, "okay, ten."

"Then I probably won't make it out," I say.

"Yes you will," he says, "because those other four-hundred-ninety people didn't have their escorts with them. Well some did, but most of them didn't. All ten people who made it out had their escorts go with them."

"And what happened to their escorts?" I ask.

"They…didn't make it out," he says.

"Gale," I say, "there's a pretty good chance that at least one of us won't make it out. Why did you come here?"

"Because," he says, "I wanted to protect you."

"And?" I ask.

"If I died, I wanted to make sure you were safe."

"Then as _a _final request," I say, "because we don't know what will be the outcome, just kiss me."

"You're going to regret it…" he says looking down.

"Then so I will," I say.

So I push my lips back to his, but then he pulls away.

"Katniss, no," he says pulling his face away from mine again. "I said no. No means no." I sigh, and after I'm sure he means it, I decide to lay down, and fall asleep. I awake in the morning with Gale's arm around me, and I slowly pull it off of me. "Morning," he says.

"Morning," I say drably.

"Katniss I'm sorry, but you know you would regret kissing me.

"I know," I say, "I just wish you wouldn't have cared."

"Trust me Katniss," he says, "it's for your own good." After a while, Gale looks and me and says, "Katniss, do you know why I started calling you Catnip?"

"Because you mis-heard my name when we met," I say, "because I said it so softly."

"No," he says, "it's because you're like catnip to me, and I'm like a cat. You're irresistible to me, and I can't resist you. I can't stay away, because you're addicting to me. And if I have too much, I'll go crazy. I _had_ to care."

"I thought you said you didn't realize you liked me until you were seventeen?" I ask.

I did," he says, "but when I met you, I knew that I had gotten myself involved into trouble."

"I don't know what to say," I tell him.

"Don't," he says pressing his finger to my lips. "Did Donner tell you about that pill?" he asks.

"Oh yeah," I say, "you invented it. Pretty cool if you ask me."

"Did he tell you how it can get addicting?"

"Yes," I say, "but he says he doesn't take it all that much." Gale laughs to him as if there's some joke I'm missing.

"Did he tell you what the pill was called?" he asks.

"No," I say. "I named it…Catnip…after you. That's how I feel with you."

"Oh," is all I can say.

I never knew how strongly Gale felt for me, and I wish he would've told me a long time ago. But what if I don't find Peeta? Would I really take Gale up on his offer? It seems that Gale is thinking the same thing that I am, because he says, "Katniss, you know you're going to find Peeta," he says.

"We don't know that," I say. I get up from the bed and change into clothes, and Gale changes as well. Later in the morning, we're both sitting on the bed, with Gale reading, and me practicing my aim at the picture hanging on the wall. There's a woman dressed in a fire-ey dressed made up of brilliant colors of reds and oranges, with red, orange, and yellow, jewels covering her clear sleeve to look as if they are part of her arm.

I keep aiming to hit her eye, but once I've hit both I aim for other parts of her face. As I get to the last of my bows, I realize that I recognize this woman. It's me, in my interview dress. But, it's a painting. Above the painting are black letters that say, "INSPIRE." Below are letters in white that say, "MOCKINGJAY." "Gale," I say, "who made that painting over there?"

"Oh," he chuckles. "Peeta made it for you." I become very shocked.

"How'd you get it?" I ask.

"He, just gave it to me," he says.

"Why?" I ask.

"I don't know. He knew about my business, and thought we deserved some inspirational pictures, and since you are The Mockingjay, he just gave it to me. Kind of nice if you ask me, considering he knows how I feel. Something I sure wouldn't do to competition."

"Wow," I say admiring the picture. But then I realize, everyone seems to have known a lot more than I have. But why? Why did no one tell me? I swear, when I find Peeta, and get back to 12, I'm going to be asking LOTS of questions.

"What's it like?" Gale asks.

"What's what like?" I ask as I've just launched the last arrow into my painting's mouth.

"Can you stop that?" he asks, "you're ruining it."

"Sorry," I say.

"To be in love," he answers, "and have the other person love you back."

"Gale, please don't make me feel more guilty about this," I say.

"No," he says, "I generally want to know."

"But you're making me feel bad," I say.

"Well you shouldn't," he says, "if you're not in love with me." This is the exact reason I decided Peeta was the best for me. Because of Gale's fire. And stubbornness. It was too much like me, and I needed someone who could comfort me, and make me feel better, not keep denying my choices.

"It's not like that Gale," I say, "I don't have to be in love with you to feel bad for you."

"Well I would think so," he says.

"Well you would think wrong," I say getting up from the bed and getting angry now. "You wouldn't know Gale," I say, "because you've never had anyone love you back."

"All I'm saying is-…"

"All you're saying is wrong!" I say, "Gale don't ask me questions when you are going to go ahead and answer them yourself, and answer them wrong!" I open the room door and march out, slamming it behind me. Immediately a train worker appears by his side.

"Mrs. Everdeen," he says, "I advise you to stay in your room."

"And I advise you to not tell me what to do," I say shoving my way through him. But he pushes me back.

"Ma'am, I can't let you do that."

"But I think you can," I say trying to push through him again. All of a sudden the door opens behind me, and Gale grabs me.

"Sorry," he says to the man, and then he shuts the door behind him. He covers my mouth as I try to scream, but even when I lick his hand he won't let me go.

"Relax," he says with a hiss.

"Let- me- go…" I try to say, but nothing comes out. He finally lets me go, and I slap him. "Gale I thought you were being nice now," I say.

"Who said I was nice?" he asks.

"Just stop this trickery stuff," I say.

"I'm sorry," he says, "it's out of my control."

"As if I know what that means," I mutter. That night, when I go to bed, Gale's already asleep, and his hand is curled up. What could he be holding? I carefully tip toe over to him, and carefully un-curl his hand. In it, is 1 of the Catnip Pills.

I notice the bottle on the bedside table, and I pick it up. It's empty. I read the label where it says how many it contains. 50. Holy shit. I twirl it in my fingers, examining it in the light, and read the back label. **WARNING: Catnip Pills may cause serious addiction, causing hazards to the health. These side effects may include: Unusual behavior, abusive behavior, sexual behavior, aggressive behavior, madness, cannibalism, short-term memory loss, long-term memory loss, miscarriages, and even death. Please only take Catnip Pills as little as possible, when necessary and as prescribed. **So that's why he's been acting so weird! "Gale!" I scream in his ear.

"Aaah!" he screams as he wakes up, clutching his ear. I'm practically in tears when he sees me. "Katniss, what's going on?" I hold up the bottle and point to his hand. He looks at his hand with a confused face. "Wha?" he asks, "how did that get there?"

"You've become addicted Gale! You don't remember taking all the pills! You took 49 of them!"

"Please Katniss," he says, "I think I'd know if I was addicted or not," he laughs.

"Of course you wouldn't!" I say, "because you have short-term memory loss! That's why you've been acting weird and kissed me!"

"Katniss," he says, "I didn't kiss you because of the addiction."

"You wouldn't know," I say. "Gale this is serious! And why did you laugh when I talked about Donner and the pills?"

"Because Donner's the worst of all of us!" he says, "his personality has completely changed, he was this super tough, quiet guy, and all of a sudden he's too happy and acts like a different person. Katniss, when he first got addicted, he hit his wife. That's why she left him. He doesn't even remember her, and when we try to tell him he's addicted he gets really aggressive. If you think I'm bad, you should get to know him."

"That's not the point Gale!" I say shocked with this news about Donner. "You could get that way!"

"At least I'm happy," he says.

"No you're not!" I scream."Gale you need to stop this! You could _die_."

"I invented it Katniss," he says, "I'm not going to die." I throw the bottle against the wall and let out a grunt. I grab my pillow and two blankets and walk towards the bathroom. "Katniss, where are you going?" he asks. I keep walking. "Katniss!" he shouts. I open up the bathroom door and shut it behind me, making sure to lock it. I walk over to the bathtub and lay the pillow over the drain, and one blanket in front of it. I climb in and lay down on the blanket, and pull the other over me.

"Katniss!" he shouts again.

"Goodnight," I say rudely. Then I shut out the lights and fall asleep. When I awake in the morning, I see that some light is showing from the window. I rub my eyes and stretch as I let out a yawn, and pull back the curtains to look out. I notice we are still underground, but we are slowly going higher and higher underground, so it's getting lighter each time. "Attention passenger," the voice says, "we will be arriving soon. Thank you."

"Katniss…" I hear a tired voice say. I walk over to the door and put my ear up against it. "Katniss…" Gale's voice repeats again. I hear him slowly banging on the door.

"Gale?" I say, "have you been knocking all night?"

"No," he says tiredly, "just for an hour." I open the door, which makes him stumble backwards. I walk over to my bag and start packing up everything.

"We're here already?" I ask.

"It's a three day ride, except you're only on the train for two full days."

"Where am I being let off?" I ask.

"Underground," he says, "then we've gotta go through a secret pathway that leads under the gate of District 13. Then we go up, and you're in the underground levels of 13. We're actually way below the deepest parts of 13, so they won't accidentally dig and find us."

"We?" I ask. "Oh not this again…Katniss I'm tired of getting in these constant fights," he says.

"Look Gale," I say, "I think I can handle this on my own. After all, I've survived a Hunger Games and a half."

"No you can't," he says, "there's a bunch of booby traps. Mines everywhere, trap doors, bomb walls, you make one wrong step and BOOM! You're dead."

"Is that why the other four-hundred-ninety didn't make it out?" I ask.

"Yes," he says, "we advised them to go with their escorts, but they wouldn't have of it. They all wanted to go on their own."

"Why are there so many booby traps?" I ask.

"We built them there at first planning to have another path that the people would go through, and that path was going to be a trick path for people from 13 who found about us, and who were trying to get us busted.

"But when we blueprinted the plans for the actual hidden path, we realized that in order to get it to go to the exact spot the other one went to, we'd have to drill up higher, and we'd have to go through 13 as the path rose. But because there are rock walls supporting the underground, there wasn't anywhere where we could replicate that path."

"Oh," I say, "then why do you even have this?"

"Because," he says, "we planned it for the escorts to go with the people, and we all know exactly where every trap is, so we thought it would be safe. But one woman, who was really insane, insisted she went on her own, and her escort wouldn't let her, so she killed him."

"Oh," I say, "how lovely."

"She ended up making it to 13," he says.

"Really?" I ask. "How do you know?"

"Because the headline of the newspaper the following week was **"MAD WOMAN BREAKS IN TO 13, AND IS MISTAKABLY KILLED BY A SECURITY GUARD." **

"Right," I say, "_mistakably._"

"Yeah," he says, "_mistakably…_"

"Attention," the voice says over the speakers, "we are here. Please come to the front to leave."

"Why can't they say my name or destination?" I ask.

"Just in case someone was listening in," Gale says, "it's all for safety purposes."

Gale grabs his pack and I grab mine, and we walk out of the room to the front of the train. This time there isn't a ticket man here, and Gale tells me to keep going. I walk out of the train, with Gale following behind me, and as soon as he steps off, the train doors close behind us and takes off. "That was fast," I say, "why'd they leave that quickly?"

"All for safety," he repeats.

"Well in that case…" I say. I open my pack, grab my bag of arrows, and throw it around my shoulders. I take out the bow and set it aside, put on my pack, and then tuck the bow under my arm.

He sighs and gives me a face that says, "Really?"

"For safety purposes," I mock him.

I look around. It's lighter, but there's still the same grey walls and grey floors. I look to where the train came from and left, and all there is are two large tunnels, pitch black that lead to somewhere. No other paths anywhere. "So where's the path?" I ask.

"Follow me," he says. He walks over to a large boulder, and pushes it out of the way. Behind it is a shovel, only the handle visible, the rest in the ground. He pulls it out with a lot of force, and throws it on the ground. He moves the boulder back, then looks around, mumbling things to himself. "Ah!" he exclaims. He walks to a certain spot in front of the boulder, and digs a tiny bit. All of a sudden a large hole opens up, and he hides the shovel back behind the boulder.

He jumps down the hole, and I look down to see him. "Don't worry," he says, "it's safe. Just jump down and I'll catch you." I do as he says, and sure enough he catches me. Once he lets me down, I look up, and the hole slowly closes. "Okay Katniss," he says turning to me and placing his hands on my shoulder, "no matter what happens, always stay behind me. If anything happens to me-…"

"Nothing will happen to you," I say.

"But if something does," he says, "I need you to stop. If you keep going, you'll surely die, so just stay where you are, and use this." He reaches for something in his pocket, and hands it to me.

It's a grey and black device that sort of looks like a walky-talky. "Just press this red button, and help will come to take you back."

"So just, give up?" I ask.

"Either that or death," he says, "you need to be safe," he says.

"Gale," I say, "how have you survived all this time."

"Because," he says, "most of the time I'm in office, not in the fields, but when I am in the fields, I always get the people who don't need an escort."

"So you've never done this before?" I ask.

"I have," he says, "when I made it," he adds with a smile.

Now let's go, and stay close behind me. We start walking, and there really isn't any other place to go than behind him because the path is very narrow. "Careful," he occasionally says, but most of the time he just remains quiet. We keep walking, and at one point he says, "Now careful, if you hit this wall right here a bomb will blow up your shoulder."

"How lovely," I say swerving closer to the other side. As we continue on, the path becomes narrower and narrower, making it harder to avoid the traps. I suddenly understand how I would have not been able to survive. Unless I had that device that Jackson had given me, that showed me where all the traps were. This place is much more complicated then I thought. There's literally a bomb everywhere, and there's barely space to walk without dying. Bombs on the floor, bombs on the ceilings, bombs on the wall, nets that pick you up and bomb that drops on you, animal traps that slowly close in on you and pierce your skin to death. Why did they have to make it this deathly? "How far is it?" I ask growing tired.

"We're almost there," he says, "but we've got one problem."

"What is it?" I ask.

"Well, towards the end there'll be one big trigger," he says, "and if you step on it a series of bombs set off, and if you don't run fast enough they'll catch up with you and kill you. So since this path is narrow, it's going to be very hard to-…" Gale's interrupted all of a sudden. He looks down, and I follow his eyes, only to see that his shoe has just been torn through, and his foot is a bloody mess. Beneath his foot, lays a square chunk of metal that was buried under the dirt, and has now risen up. "RUN!" he screams.

But I can't. My thoughts are stopped as I look down at the many skeletons laying everywhere. There's the majority of the four-hundred-ninety people who didn't make it out. I grow very dizzy, and I feel like I'm going to pass out now. Everything is very foggy, and I don't understand why the bombs haven't gone off yet, because my brain has slowed down, and it feels like it's been forever. But before I know it, Gale has dropped to the ground, clutching his foot. Horror hits me and I soon realize three things. One, his foot is broken. Two, he can't walk. Three, he's going to die.

"RUN!" He shouts at me, "RUN!" But before I can do anything, my body has already charged into a sprint, and I'm running faster than I ever have in my entire life. BOOM! The first bomb goes off. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! They're coming faster now, and as they do I am running out of breath. But then, everything seems to slow down, allowing me more time to run. The bombs are now getting closer, but up ahead I see a tunnel of light. This must be the way out. I push myself forward, and right as the last bomb catches up with me, I spring myself out, jumping into the air, and once the bomb goes off, I land onto a flat hard surface. I look back behind me, and then look forward. I realize one thing, and one thing only.

I have made it out alive.


	6. Apology

**My Dearest Apologies**

Hello readers! I know you're probably pretty shocked to see an email with an update from me! I want to start out by saying how deeply sorry I am for now updating in what seems like a decade. Unfortunately my computer had crashed, so I was writing all of my stories off a dinosaur laptop which crashed every five minutes. Then that broke, and I was left computerless. But at last, I have a new (and quite fast if I might add) computer! I transferred my old files, and now I can finally update! Don't worry, I have a few chapters after the ones I posted that I've been saving, and have continued my stories on my phone. Now to copy and paste for an hour! (Yikes!) But I want you guys to know that even if it's months before I update (which it should not be because that is RIDICULOUS), that I will ALWAYS update and never just stop a story without telling you guys. It's no longer Summer for me, and school's started up again so it's been harder to update, but I will try my best! I hope I haven't lost any readers and that the wait was well worth it! I will try to put some new chapters up tonight, and if not then definitely tomorrow. I must go now, I have hours of writing to do. (And maybe some new stories….ooh…..) Thanks for being so awesome!

Read, Rate, Review

-FallingFantasy


	7. Chapter 6: Don't Die

**AUTHOR'S NOTE: **Finally! An update! Let's correct that, here is a whole SERIES of updates for you guys. I am so sorry it took this long, finally I have a free day (woohoo!) and have made much progress! Thanks for all your support and enjoy!

* * *

**Chapter 6; Don't Die**

I am panting heavily, staring behind me in disbelief that I am not dead yet. But then a thought occurs to me. I may be alive, but Gale is surely dead. "GALE!" I scream still stuck on the floor. "GALE!" But there's no answer, just the echo of my voice. I push myself up from the ground and start to run back, avoiding the craters that the bombs made. "GALE!" I scream again, tears now coming from my eyes, "GALE! WHERE ARE YOU?!" I come to the spot where Gale stepped on the metal plate, and look down expecting to see Gale's body. But instead, there's not a body there. There's just ground.

Where could he have gone? Was his body blasted into pieces? But then I would see a new skeleton or at least new skeleton pieces. "GALE!" I scream. Still no answer. I slowly back up to the left wall, and hit my head against it while I lean on it. I don't hide the tears any more, and just let them go full out. I press my hands behind me, trying to clutch onto the wall, but there's nothing to clutch onto. Instead, my hands push the wall in, and I fall backwards with a shriek. I fall for not long, and end up landing on something.

"Ouch!" it exclaims. I turn over and see that what I landed on was Gale.

"Gale!" I shout throwing my arms around him. I start crying again, this time out of relief. He pulls me in for a hug, and rests his head on my shoulder, pulling me tight. "I thought you were dead," I whisper.

"I thought you were dead too," he whispers back. I pull away, and sit down next to him. I look around, and notice that there's nothing to see. The room isn't even a room, it's just a small circle that is only big enough for both of us to lay down, and if we sit we have a tiny bit more room to move around. The floor is just soft dirt, and the walls are hard and metal.

"What is this?" I ask him grabbing his hand.

"It's a trap door-bomb shelter," he says, "except it's more of a safety door. I escaped into here right as the first bomb went off, or the second really if you count my foot." We both look down at his foot, and I can't stand to look at it. I place my hand on the parts of the shoe that isn't torn, and carefully remove it.

"Ouch," he says, "that burns." I place the shoe in front of his foot, and lift his leg up so his foot is elevated on the shoe.

But then I notice a little bit of blood coming from his ankle. I slowly roll up his jean leg, and notice that his entire knee down is torn up and bleeding like crazy.

"Gale!" I shout shocked. "The bomb got your leg too?"

"No," he says, "it was a silent bomb, which means you couldn't hear it, but the tears slowly spread up from the first injury, until it kills you."

"Gale!" I say, "we need to get you out of here right now!"

"We can't," he says, "thing about this place is that once you're in, you can't get out. We forgot to build an exit."

"Gale this isn't okay! We have to get you to a hospital or something now!"

"We can't Katniss," he says as he lay down, "at least we didn't get blown up."

"But you're going to die!" I shout at him. "The walky-talky!" I shout.

"What?" he asks.

"The thing you gave me!" I reach into my pocket and grab the walky-talky-like device he gave me. I press the big red button in the middle, but nothing happens. "Shouldn't someone be coming right away?" I ask.

"They can't get here that fast Katniss," he says, "we'll have to wait."

"But what if we were about to die?"

"Things have been slower lately," he says, "we're trying to stay clear from 13, and we're worried that they've been having suspicions." After waiting for a while, nothing has happened. No one has come, and no one has called back on the device. I press the button again, and multiple times after that, practically jamming the thing. "Katniss just stop," Gale says, "it's useless." I notice that he seems to be growing more and more tired by the hour.

"No Gale!" I say, "I'm going to get a hold of someone!" I keep pressing the button, but still, nothing happens. After hitting my head against the wall multiple times, a thought suddenly comes to me.

"Donner!" I exclaim.

"What?" he asks.

"Not what, who!" I shout excitedly.

"Huh?" he asks.

"Shut up shut up shut up!" I say grabbing my backpack. I take out the tiny slip of paper with Donner's phone number on it and take out my phone. "Damn it," I say, "no service." Gale takes the walky-talky from me and pulls up a tab, revealing an underneath layer of buttons with numbers on them. "It's a phone too?!" I ask.

"Yeah," he says growing dreary.

"Why didn't you say this before?" I ask getting angry.

"I don't know…." He says closing his eyes, "I'm tired…." I quickly dial the number and put the phone up to my ear.

"Hello?" Donner says through the phone.

"Donner!" I exclaim.

"Hey Katniss," he says seeming to be surprised that I'm calling. Maybe he thought I'd be dead by now.

"Donner, I need that favor."

"What is it?" he asks.

"Gale and I are trapped."

"Trapped?" he asks, "where?"

"Secret trap by that mine in the passage. Gale's entire left leg is really bad, and he needs help immediately.

"Say no more!" Donner assures me, "I'm on my way." The phone hangs up and I put it back in my bag.

"Donner's coming Gale," I say, "he's going to help you." I notice that Gale's eyes are closed and his head is slightly bobbing from side to side.

"Gale?" I ask. "Gale, can you hear me?" No response. "Gale you need to stay with me," I say, "Donner will be here soon."

Donner arrives a few hours after in his helicopter, and lifts the roof of the chamber off with a claw that's attached. He lets down a rope ladder, and I get up from my spot and start climbing up it. He hugs me as soon as I get up, and goes down to carry Gale up. He sets Gale down on a hospital bed in the back, and starts driving.

"Ellina will take care of you Gale," Donner says. A woman emerges from the back and immediately starts tending to Gale.

"Who's she?" I ask.

"Company nurse," Donner replies. I hop up to the front with Donner and put a pair of headphones on.

"Um, Donner, where are you going?" I ask as I notice he's turned around.

"Back," he says.

"Back?" I ask, "no no no no! We have to go forward!"

"We can't Katniss," he says, "too much protection in 13. If we could you wouldn't have had to go through all that trouble."

"No Donner you don't understand!" I say, "I can't just give up now! I have to keep going!"

"We can't-…"

"No!" I scream, "I'm tired of being told that I can't! I can! I want off this helicopter now!"

"Katniss…" he starts. I get up from my chair and press the button that turns the helicopter on auto-pilot. I slam my hand down on the control board and say, "Donner, I want off this helicopter now, or I'm going to jump out."

Donner lets out a sigh and looks over at Gale. "He can't go with you," he whispers, "not in his condition."

"Good," I say, "I don't want him coming. I want to do this on my own. Now where can you drop me off?" Donner turns the helicopter off of auto-pilot and pulls up a blue holographic map.

"Let's see," he says, "we're just a little bit away from that door, so if we turn around now I can get you to the ending mark of the booby trap pathway that becomes the new safe pathway."

"Good," I say, "I'll be in the back." I hop over the seats and walk over to where Ellina and Gale are. "How is he?" I ask her.

"Doing better," she says, "I gave him some pain killers, and I've stopped the bleeding."

"Katniss," Gale says as he slightly opens his eyes, "I need to tell you something."

"Don't bother," I say, "you need your rest. You can tell me later." With that he gives a slight nod and falls asleep.

"He loves you," Ellina says, "I can tell by the tone of his voice when he speaks to you." I take a big gulp and walk to sit in the back seats. "You don't love him?" Ellina asks. I see her reflection in the front mirror. She's tall, with dark brown skin, and wears her hair in a high pony tail. She looks elderly, maybe in her 70's.

I ignore her question and stare ahead waiting to be let out. I don't know if it's good or bad that I am glad Gale is hurt. I just don't want to continue with him. I have too much guilt inside me, and I need to do this alone.

"Okay Katniss," I hear Donner's voice say, "grab that parachute and put it on. There's some diving goggles in the chest." I get the items and put them on, and prepare to dive. I grab my personal backpack and hook it to the straps on my chest. Donner puts the helicopter on auto-pilot and comes up next to me. "Now what you're gonna do," he starts, "crouch down by the edge…"

"Or I could just jump out," I say. So I do.

I hear Donner yelling my name from behind, but I don't pay attention to what he's saying. I land into the area that I escaped to after the bomb explosion safely, just barely making it. Luckily I figured out how to open the parachute just a few seconds before I hit the ground. I throw the pack on the ground and put mine back on. I look in front of me and see a small wooden sign. In big black bold letters it reads: **DESTINATION COMING UP AHEAD. APPROACH WITH CAUTION. **I take a deep breath and continue ahead, grabbing my bow and loading it with an arrow.

I keep walking, and at any sound I quickly prepare to launch my arrow, yet nothing has turned up as a threat. Even then, I'm still not putting my guard down. At this point, the walk is turning into a climb, and I know I'm getting higher up in the undergrounds. I kind of wish that Gale was here with me, just to help lead me, but at the same time I'm relieved he's not. The climb gets steeper and steeper, and my heart slowly begins to race. Along side with that, my backpack is getting heavier and heavier. I keep switching shoulders from which one holds the bag of arrows and which one holds the backpack, but nothing is helping, so I decide to stop and take a rest.

I throw the backpack off of me and reach over to massage my shoulders. As I reach up, something opens in the bag. "Huh?" I ask looking over. A little hole has been made, and out of it is a piece of white paper. "Damn," I say, "how am I supposed to fix this?" I grab the paper and carefully open it. Inside it says:

_Katniss-_

_I can't guarantee you the guards are just going to let you through. Even though you were, are the Mockingjay, thirteen has become much different from the last time you were there. They have secrets. Secrets they don't want you to know, because they know you, and they know that if you're un-happy, that you'll tell the secrets. I didn't want to tell you this, but there's this thing going around, everyone doesn't want to piss you off, because they're saying that "you'll start another rebellion." _As if I don't already know this. _ I just respect you too much to not let you know. But if anyone gives you trouble, use this on them._

I turn my attention to a little silver, circular object that has fallen out of the note. It has a blue light in the middle. "What is this?" I ask myself.

_Just leave the task to the stunner. No questions. If you're in a mess, make sure the blue light is facing the person holding you back, and press the button on the top, and run. That's all. Good luck to you Katniss._

_-Donner_

I maneuver the "stunner" in my hands, trying to find the button. As said, it's right at the top. I put the stunner in my pocket and try to figure out how to fix my bag. All of a sudden, another paper slides out of the bag. I open up and it says:

_P.S.: Use this on your bag._

Below the words is a little patch of cloth, the same color as my bag. It seems to be stuck to the paper, so I expect to have to yank it off, but instead, it just peels right off smoothly. I look around for glue or something to keep it on, but Donner has left me nothing. Hopeless, I put the patch over the hole, and it sticks. I stay on the ground, thinking what I'll do. I'll have to make it past the guards and get to the Justice Building underground, where Paylor will be. Then I'll ask her about Peeta. That's as far as my plan goes.

I get back up, and keep heading up-hill. As I go, memories flash back to me. I remember arriving in 13, and having to change into that ugly uniform. I remember Peeta warning me that the bombing was coming, and how we all had to go deeper underground. How Prim was missing, and we realized she went to get Buttercup. How Gale had come down with her, just in time before we were bombed again. How we had gotten Peeta back, how happy I was to see him. How when I went to hug him, how he choked me, how his brain had been hijacked. How devastated I was. How I just wanted my Peeta back. The one who loved me. The one who would do anything for me.

All of a sudden I feel water fall on my foot. I look down, and then look up. It isn't raining. I feel my face, and notice I'm crying. I just want Peeta back at this point. I want to know who killed Prim, but more than anything I just want Peeta. This encourages me even more. So I force myself up, and keep climbing, no matter how much my legs are burning. As I walk, I decide to think. Just think, about everything. So what if I didn't find out who killed Prim? Would it really matter? It wouldn't have been that big of a deal to Prim; it's just that big of a deal to _me._

What about Cinna? And Finnick? Thresh. Bonnie and Twill. Boggs. Jackson. Mags. Rue. Foxface. Cray. Darius. Lavinia. Everyone who died. Maybe even Peeta. Oh god. No. Not Peeta. I need Peeta to be alive right now. I can't think of living without him, knowing he's never returning. I'd go crazy. Well, crazier than I already am. I'd kill myself. It just isn't possible.

I decide to take another rest. I lay down on the ground, placing my backpack under my head, to serve as a pillow. "Peeta," I say, "where are you?"


	8. Chapter 7: Paylor

**Chapter 7: Paylor**

_Paylor's P.O.V.:_

"President Paylor!" Rubarb says, running towards me, "someone's broke in! Past the boundary line!"

"Well who is it?!" I ask, getting panicked.

"We can't tell," he says, running out of breath, "they're too quick. What should we do?"

I pause for a moment and think, long and hard.

"Send out the mutts."


	9. Chapter 8: Close Enough to Touch

**Chapter 8: Close Enough to Touch**

_Katniss's P.O.V.:_

"Peeta," I whispered, "Peeta wake up."

"Huh?" he had asked rubbing his eyes.

He looked up, and saw me leaning over him.

"Katniss," he said, "how did you get in here?"

"I crawled in through the window," I said.

"Of course," he laughed. "What's wrong?"

"Peeta, I keep having nightmares," I said, "I can't stay at my house anymore. I need to get out."

Peeta had reached his arms out for me, and I crawled into bed with him, tucking myself into him. This had been before we were officially married. That's when I knew I couldn't stay in my Victor house anymore. It was just too much. I never could sleep in my room. I couldn't work up the guts to remove that white rose.

"You know, I don't really think Sae will be too happy when she finds you here," he laughed, "she's really old fashioned. She doesn't like it that we sleep together and we're not officially married yet."

"Well we're not doing anything," I said.

"Not right now," he laughed.

"Oh shut up," I said nudging him. I rested my head on his chest, and wrapped my arm across him. He was so firm, and muscular, he always made me feel safe when I was in his arms.

"What was your dream about this time?" he asked softly.

I hesitated before answering, "You."

This seemed to shock him a bit. "What about me?"

"It was right before they hijacked you," I admitted.

This made him shutter. I knew he still had these awful thoughts and memories, but he had to convince himself that they weren't real. "I wish," he said, "I wish I could watch the videos, without wanting to kill you."

_I_ shuttered now. That was right. Peeta couldn't watch these tapes, because they used them against him.

"It was when I saw them beating you, and pulling you away," I said, "but in my nightmare, they killed you." He hugged me tighter, and kissed my head.

"It was just a dream," he said, "I'm here now." He kissed me on the lips, very gently, and together, we fell fast asleep. This was such a good memory I had. Until morning came. I woke up, finding Peeta not in the bed. I went downstairs, looking for him, and found him in the corner, grabbing onto a chair. He was having a memory.

"Peeta," I said softly, quietly approaching him, "don't listen to it. It's not real." He was struggling to not lose control.

"No," he managed to break out.

"What?" I asked.

"NO!" He screamed. He picked up the chair and threw it against the wall, breaking it. He turned around and looked at me. He was full of rage and anger. "YOUR FAULT!" He yelled, getting closer to me. I started to walk backwards, but I fell on the ground, and began to crawl. He led me into the corner, and I was trapped.

"YOUR FAULT!" He yelled again.

"Peeta stop!" I said, "they aren't real! They hijacked you! You need to stop! It's okay! I'm not here to hurt you!"

He didn't listen. He balled his fists, getting angrier and angrier, and my eyes got wider and wider, full of fear.

"Peeta please," I said, "snap out of it."

All of a sudden Peeta un-balled his fists and opened his eyes. He looked around, and saw the broken chair, and then turned to me, who was still staring in fear.

"Oh, Katniss," he said calmly.

He reached out for me, but I scooted away from him. He crouched down on the floor with me, and reached his hand out for me.

"I did it again, didn't I?" he asked.

I nodded my head, still afraid.

"Please," he said.

I gave him my hand, and he pulled me in to hug him.

"I'm sorry," he said, "I'm so, so sorry."

I awake in the morning, trying to resume myself to reality. Peeta isn't here, like he was in my dreams. But he has to be close by. I'm almost to District 13. I start to walk again, finishing the climb. As I climb up higher, I notice a tunnel of light. District 13. I get a tighter grip on my bow, and make sure that stunner is tightly in my pocket.

"Let's do this," I say. I walk out into the tunnel; the light is so bright I have to cover my eyes.

As I walk out, I notice I'm in the woods of District 13.

"I'm here," I exclaim with bright eyes and a smile. "Finally!"

I start to walk forward, keeping my bow and arrows handy, and staying cautious. Alert. Anything could pop out of me at any time. I decide to climb up a tree to look to see which way to go. I find the highest one, and climb up to the top to look around. The forest isn't too big, so I won't have to walk for long. Out of the forest is a path that leads to the Justice Building.

"Wow," I say, "this is just too easy."

"Think again," a voice says. I look down, and notice two men on the ground.

"I suggest you get down here before we have to do the job ourselves," one of the guys says.

I climb down the tree, and start to run, but the men grab me immediately.

"Let me go!" I scream.

"Now _this_," one of them says, "is just too easy." They both wear black tuxedos, and are very tall, that gives off an intimidating look.

"Should we take her to Paylor?" one of them asks. Yes! Yes! That's perfect.

"That would work," I say.

"Then we better not," he corrects himself.

"Yeah," the other one says, "probably wants to kill her."

"No I don't!" I say, "I just need to talk to her!"

"Yeah," one of them says, "that's what they all say." I try to kick free, but they won't let me.

"Woh, hold up man, this one looks familiar."

"Huh?" he asks, "let me see." He takes a look at me, and studies my face deeply. "Oh!" he exclaims, "I know who this is! It's The Mockingjay!"

"Oh dude, our mistake."

"So you're gonna let me go right?" I ask.

"Of course not!" he says, "you're even more dangerous than the other ones. But, we won't kill you this time. We'll just lock you up."

"No!" I scream. All of a sudden I remember the stunner. I slowly slide it out of my pocket, and turn it so the light faces them.

"Smile," I say cleverly. I press the button, and all of a sudden they release me. "Hello?" I ask. They're completely frozen, as still as can be. I look at the stunner, and there's a timer going. It's counting down. So that's what this does. I assume the countdown is how much time left till they resume to normal, so I start running as fast I can, out of the woods. What a trip this will be.


	10. Chapter 9: Victory Isn't That Easy

**Chapter 9: Victory Isn't That Easy **

I finally make my way out of the woods, and right ahead is the Justice Building. I start to run towards it, thinking how easy this was. But I spoke too soon.

Suddenly, grey clouds fill the sky, and a flash of lightning strikes just a few miles away. I run faster, getting panicked by the sound, when suddenly I hear a deep, low growling sound. I arm myself with my bow and arrow, ready to shoot whatever is here to face me.

"Help!" a girl's voice yells off in the distance, "Help! HELP!"

"Who's there?!" I shout out, getting more frightened.

Suddenly I see a small girl running my way, but then I notice that there is something familiar about this girl. As she gets closer, I drop my bow and arrow to the floor, paralyzed by shock and fear. It's Rue.

But it can't be. That's impossible.

"Rue?!" I shout out, afraid for my life.

"Katniss!" she shouts, "Help-…" all of a sudden her voice is cut off, and she falls to the ground, disappearing. I look around, and out of nowhere I am pushed to the ground by a great force. On top of me lays a large, grey dog, with piercing brown eyes and fangs. It's a mutt.

My first instinct is to shoot it, but then I realize my bow and arrows aren't in my grasp anymore. I struggle my way through, trying to push the large mutt off of me, and succeed. I grab my bow and arrows and run towards the Justice Building, but the mutt follows me and pins me to the ground again. I immediately grab the stunner and flash it in the mutt's face, but it seems to make him angrier, and he begins to dig his claws into my skin. Soon many more come, and all begin to rip my clothes, and shred my skin to pieces.

Everything around me slows down, and I can hear what's left of my heart beating. Venom stings throughout all of my body, rushing down my blood stream. My vision becomes blurry, and it starts to fade out. So right when I think I am dying, the last thing I hear is a voice.

"Stop."


	11. Chapter 10: Death Come Quickly

**Chapter 10: Death Come Quickly**

I awaken in a large cell, lying down on a small, dirty cot. I lift up my arms, and move my legs around, all working in perfect condition. No broken bones. No skinless body parts. Just me. With a few minor scratches and wounds. I get up, amazed that I can still stand, and place my hand on my head to try to calm my pounding headache. What was that? But there's no time to dwell over my insanity, I need to get out of here.

I pace around, wondering what I'm supposed to do. I sit down on the dirty bed in the cell, and all of a sudden I hear a cry. I look to my right, and see a black cat with a white belly. The white spreads up to his neck, and covers his chin, goes up to his nose, and circles around his eyes. His little white paws walk over towards me, and he jumps up on the bed next to me.

"Dumb rascal," I mutter, "rubbing up on me isn't going to help anything." The cat jumps down, and walks through the bars. "You!" I shout, "You can help me get out of here!" I think about exactly what the cat could do. Not much. "Go get the key boy!" I say, "get the key!" The cat just purrs and rubs against the bars. I sigh. "Dumb rascal," I say again.

It's almost like he's taunting me on purpose.

"Look at me," his face says, "I have freedom. I can go and come as I please, but you? Not a chance."

"Stupid rascal," I mutter.

I watch him more as he goes in and out of the bars. He senses it too, because he continues to do so. But soon my attention turns to something else. The cell is the only one in the room, trapped by tow metal walls right up against it, so the only bars that I can see out of are the front ones. To the left of the cell, the left metal wall has a door that goes far beyond where the bars are. The door has a window with more short bars over it, and seems to be cracked open a bit.

Through the bars, I can see a few tools hanging from the wall. Something that looks like a knife, the other a drill. One a big heavy gun, and lastly a crow a bar. Below them I can see the tips of glowing orange flames in the dark. Suddenly I realize what that room is for, and shutter at the thought.

If I don't get out of here, they'll throw me in that room. I wonder how they'll kill me. Burn me to death? Perhaps they'll stab my heart. Or maybe they'll drill my head open. Or smash me with the crowbar. Maybe it's not even a killing room. Maybe it's a torture room. Even worse.

The crowbar! The thought comes to me instantly as if it was always obvious. As my attention turns to my escape, Rascal (which I've decided to call him now), seems to take note of this. He stops playing trick or treat and comes back in the cell. He rubs up against my legs, purring, and starts to cry for attention.

"Shh!" I say, deep in thought. If I can somehow get that crowbar over here, I can expand the bars and get out. I think about what to do. I don't have my bow and arrows with me, so it's not like I can hit the bar down. I look at the floor, and notice a toy mouse. I pick it up, which seems to catch Rascal's attention, and twirl it in my hands. Without pre-meditating, I throw it over the wall. Immediately Rascal runs over there and slips through the crack in the door. He comes back with the mouse in his mouth, and drops it on the floor in front of me.

"So you like fetch, eh?" I ask. I pick up the mouse again, and move my arm back and forth, adjusting my aim. One shot at this. The hooks are rather small, and the tools are hanging by a thread, so if I can hit the crowbar and make it fall, maybe I can figure out something from there.

"Okay Katniss," I whisper, "one shot."

I throw the mouse into the air, but it _hits_ the wall instead of going over it and falls on the floor. Rascal runs over to retrieve the mouse and brings it back.

"Congratulations sweetheart," Haymitch's voice rings in my head, "You stabbed a placemat."

This makes me angrier, so I pick up the mouse and thrust it over the wall. Bang!

"Yes!" I exclaim. The crowbar knocks to the ground. But what next? I notice Rascal playing with a ball of yarn, so I take it from him, which causes him to scratch me. I slowly craft a plan, and as I do so craft my module out of the yarn. I rip large pieces off, tying each end together. At the very end I make a large hoop-like hook, and throw it over the wall. Slowly I maneuver my rod until I feel something heavy at the other end. Carefully I move the crowbar up over the wall, and once it's on top I yank it down to my side, making it land with a large thud.

This scares Rascal, so he quickly runs out of the cell to the other side of the bars. I pick up the crowbar and smash the bars open and run through, finally free. The first thing I do is run into the torture room, where I find my backpack and bow and arrows. There are many other tools too that I couldn't see before, but there's no time to take a museum walk. I run out of the room, where two large men stand on each side of the door, but neither is paying attention. I run past them, but it isn't long until I hear and see sirens and red flashing lights going off. Two more men appear out of nowhere, so I load my bows and begin to shoot. As more appear, I do a flip in the air avoiding their bullets from their large machine guns, and shoot each down with a silver arrow. As I keep running, I see a large metal door that read's "**President Paylor's Office**" on it. I smile as I see it, but right as I push open the door another man appears from the side. We both fall in the room right as he's about to shoot me.

"Hold it," a familiar voice says.

"President Paylor!" the man shouts, dropping the gun and saluting her.

"Leave her be," she says, gesturing to me.

"But ma'am this delinquent was trying to-…"

"Leave her be," she repeats firmly.

"Yes President Paylor," the man says as he quickly leaves.

"You don't know how glad I am to see you," I begin as I walk over to sit on the opposite side of her desk.

"Thanks for killing all of my men," she says laughing.

"Oh," I say, looking back towards the door, "sorry about that."

"It's fine," she says, "I can always make more."

"_Make?_" I ask confused.

"I mean find," she quickly says, cutting me off. "So how's Peeta? The kids?"

You've got to be kidding me. She's really asking me how Peeta is?

"I don't know," I say a bit angry, "you should know."

"Huh?" she asks acting confused.

"Look Paylor I don't have time for games," I say, standing up and slamming my hand on her desk.

"Katniss I really don't know what you're talking about-…"

"Look," I say, "Peeta came over here for some special emergency about eight months ago correct?"

"Correct," she answers.

"Well all I know is he hasn't come home since then. So where, is, he?"

Her face drops and her eyes become wide with panic. I finally got her.

"Katniss," she says, "Peeta left eight months ago. I thought he was home with _you_."


	12. Chapter 11: Close but Far

**Author's Note:**

**Hey guys! Sorry I haven't updated in a really long time; I've just had a lot going on. But please remember that I will ALWAYS update no matter what and would never just leave you hanging! Thanks for being such loyal fans and I hope you enjoy this short chapter! Please review too and let me know what you think! Thanks!**

_**-FallingFantasy**_

* * *

**Chapter 11: Close But Far**

"PEETA!" I shout as I run, "PEETA WHERE ARE YOU?!"

"Katniss!" Paylor calls after me, "Katniss wait!"

"PEETA!" I continue to shout as I run, ignoring her shouts. "PEETA PLEASE!"

"Katniss stop!" Paylor shouts.

Suddenly I fall to the ground and start digging my fingernails in the dirt. In the first games Peeta hid himself with his camouflage techniques when he was hurt because it was his only option. Maybe he's done that now.

"PEETA! PEETA WHERE ARE YOU?!" I continue to shout as I dig, deeper and deeper. Suddenly my vision becomes blurred, and hot tears start to stream down my face. "Please," I whisper as I finally stop digging, "please."

Paylor slowly approaches me, being cautious of my emotional state.

"Katniss," she says in a calming voice, almost cooing as you would to a baby, "It's okay." She places a hand on my back and kneels down on the ground next to me.

"Where is he?" I ask, "You _have_ to know something."

She gulps. I wait for an answer, but there's still no response.

"Tell me," I hiss at her.

"Okay," she finally says after a while, "let's go inside."

"No," I snap at her, "tell me _here_."

"Katniss," she whispers, "trust me I would if I could, but….." She looks around hastily and then continues. "_They _could be watching."

"What?" I ask in confusion, "Who are you talking about?"

"Come inside quickly Katniss," she says, looking up at the sky, a panicked look spreading across her face, "I'll tell you then."

"Okay," she says as she shuts the door behind her. She takes a seat across from me where I have already sat. "Katniss I truly did think Peeta returned home safely to you," she tells me, "but I'm not surprised that he didn't."

"Why?" I ask her, suspicious.

"Katniss," she says, "I'm not supposed to share this information with anyone. You have to swear not to tell a single soul."

"Yeah yeah whatever," I say.

"No Katniss," she says, "you need to swear."

"I swear," I say.

"Okay," she says, leaning in closer to me. "Katniss, there's another authority, or another power, and they're watching over us."

"Another _power_?" I say, "You mean like…another district?"

"Precisely," she says, "I know districts haven't been used how they used to before the war, since we have a Democracy government system now, but this other district, they want things back how they were. And when I say things back how they were, I mean _everything._"

I shudder. If they mean everything, that means the Hunger Games included.

"So which district is it?" I ask, "Two? Four?"

"It's not one of the current existing ones," she says, "as a matter of fact, it's not even on the ground."

I give her a puzzled look.

"Katniss," she says, "you know how you questioned me when I told you we could…._make _more soldiers?"

"Yes….." I say, a little worried now.

"Well," she says, "I meant what I said. As the years have gone by, we've found that people haven't been as physically and emotionally strong as they used to be. It turns out The Games had an effect on everyone. That's what gave us such a great army during the rebellion."

The mention of The Games and the rebellion send cold chills down my spine.

"We had our top scientists here in 13 develop a… 'formula' so to speak. The formula created mutants. Strong mutants. That we could use for our army. But they were _too_ strong. Some of them broke out and…."

"Created their own district," I finish for her.

She nods her head.

"They were created with great speed, strength, and skill," she tells me, "They used these abilities to make a headquarters. It's not on the ground, however."

"You mean…"

"Yes," she says, "they built in the sky."

"The _sky_?" I ask her, "How is that even possible?"

"I don't know," she says, "I've spent months trying to figure out all the scientific possibilities but…nothing adds up. They send spies down here constantly. They've already tried many attacks on us, so we had to create more of them. The only people who can stop them are their own kind, but we had to take out the chemical that made them betray us. The problem is, that chemical was also the chemical that made them so strong. Without it, we're nothing in this war."

"This can't be happening…" I say, getting up and holding my head.

"We're trying so hard," she says, "our scientists; they're trying to re-create the chemical. But every time they test it _something _different goes wrong."

"Well what am I supposed to do?!" I ask, raising my voice, "Those _freaks _that _you_ created have Peeta! They've probably killed him by now! I mean what would they want with him?!"

"I might have an idea," she says, looking a little guilty.

"Tell-me-_now_," I hiss at her.

"Katniss," she says, "the reason I had Peeta come was because of this matter. My scientists believe that a small ingredient Peeta uses to bake his cakes could help steer the chemical on track. They want the same thing we do. If we get it before them, then we win. But if they get it before us, who knows what could happen. They want more of their kind, and they want them the best they could ever have. And Peeta's the only one who can help them."

"Something he uses in his baking?" I ask, "What is it? Flour? Eggs? Sugar? Can't you just get any of that at the store?"

"It's not a normal ingredient Katniss," Paylor says, "I don't believe even Peeta has told you what he uses."

"Then how do _you _know?" I ask, anger already bubbling up inside of my core.

"Because we created it for him," she says, "unfortunately, the scientist who created it for him was killed in the Rebellion. He didn't leave any trace of the formula behind, and we need it back. We'd go get it ourselves, but I'm afraid Peeta has it locked up somewhere where even _you_ wouldn't look to find it.'

So many thoughts fluster over my head. I try to find the right words to pick and choose, but none of them transfer down and touch my tongue. Instead, I fall to the ground. I squat, clutching my stomach, shoveling my head between my knees. This _can't _be happening. There are too many things going on, more than I wished to know.

"Katniss," Paylor's soothing voice says. She squats down too, and places a hand on my shoulder. "I do not believe that they have killed Peeta. They want something from him, and if they kill him, they will never get it. They may be, however, _torturing _him."

A blow to the head. That is what just happened. I received a blow to the head. Torturing is even worse than killing. What's even worse is that even though I know how bad torturing is, I'm almost _glad_ that they could be torturing him. If they are torturing him, then at least he's still alive. What a selfish thought.

Peeta would _never _think that way. If it was me in his place, Peeta would want for them to kill me rather than torture me, so I wouldn't have to live with the pain. He would give up his selfish needs for the well-being of me. I wish I could do the same. But the thought of that there could be a single chance that Peeta's still alive, even if he's hurting, gives me hope.

"You can save him, you know," the calming voice says again.

"How?" I ask, tears still leaking from my eyes.

"Maybe we should get into details later," she tells me. "For now, I think you need to get some rest."


End file.
